Before This Ends
by vagrantastronaut
Summary: What happened with Mitsui Hisashi after the excitement of the Inter Highs? A clash with his past affiliations prompts the appearance of a detention student with not a little fighting spirit. So begins a new page in Mitsui's life, one that challenges both of them to confront what they know about friendship, and the frailties and vanities of human living.
1. Chapter 1

_All original characters are fictional. Any resemblances to existing people are unintentional. 'Blagden' is a tribute to Christopher Paolini. Slam Dunk characters belong to Inoue Takehiko._

Dearest reader, thank you for choosing this story. It means a lot to me that you are reading, not because it is the first fan fiction I have ever completed writing, but because SD has so much in it to be venerated, even if it is become old. I hope you are able to continue to discover and appreciate what Dr. T's years of effort have inspired, and I am proud to be able to contribute to this legacy of his in my own small way. If there are any mistakes in the story, they are mine. Please highlight them to me so I may learn more about Japan in the 1990s. Sincerely, VA.

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Our little tale begins on a balmy afternoon of 199-, on a quiet little side street overshadowed somewhere in the middle by the most picturesque, frothing trellis. The forest green leaves bristled against a sky glazed an intense blue, and the sun made the air as humid as one could expect in the whereabouts of this region.

Mitsui Hisashi trod down the middle of the yellow lines curving across the grey bitumen. Feeling the heat, he swiped at his forehead, sending droplets of perspiration sparkling into the air; the other hand swung a gym bag in cadence with his loping step. It held a soaked basketball jersey within, but the white school shirt he wore now was already sticking to his body. Who knew what he was thinking on a sultry afternoon such as this, sauntering down that quiet road; he didn't even notice the appearance of another, more numerous party upon the rise.

Without any apparent prompt, Mitsui suddenly looked up from the ground, whereupon perceiving the cluster of figures arrayed menacingly in his way, slowly came to a stop. His carriage straightened, and he lifted his chin. Mitsui recognised the uniforms of the others, consisting of heavy navy blue trousers and black shoes. The leader had an unlit cigarette dangling from his lip, and his paws thrust deep into his trouser pockets. He had a most ravishing quiff, oiled to mirrored perfection, and knife-sharp side-burns that were prohibited by school rules to become full mutton-chops.

"Mitsui Hisashi," the tall rake next to the leader spoke. His was a voice that far exceeded that measly physique. It swelled and rolled across the distance to where the accused stood motionless. "Did we not ask you nicely to be at our _gakuen_ at noon? Have you forgotten our unfinished business?

"You did. And I received your message," Mitsui replied. He did not think it appropriate to remind them of the condition that the messengers had stumbled back to them, courtesy of one of his team mates, who had a low tolerance of loud-mouthed brutes despite being one himself. Although he had not had a part in their punishment, Mitsui knew they would give him no quarter on his for this slight on their reputation, prowess, and pride. "But I had basketball training. I could not be all the way across town at the same time."

A cigarette was tossed to the tall rake, and the belching laugh of the leader mixed with the air. He swaggered forward with his band of devils, sauntering – the more to draw out the victory and vengeance he knew was assured against this insolent fool.

"Basketball training!" His voice was the same ravaged tone of his mirth, roughened by smoking and rising bloodlust. It didn't carry very well, but burred the attentions of everyone present. "Boys, Mitsui Hisashi, the greatest delinquent among the academies of the district, has gone back to such a useless pastime as aiming balls into a net. The leader of a gang, who would grind out any impertinence with his own fists, has run away from this 'bad path,' back to the game that has abandoned him. Groveling for it to take him back, as if our type hadn't done it before with open arms, so readily. Is this how you repay your brothers, Mitsui-san, answering hospitality with ungratefulness, allegiance with contempt?"

At this, the leader's eyes grew watery, and his countenance a parody of pitiful grief. "You've forgotten our goodwill, Mitsui, and you're looking very much worse for it. See, boys! His haircut is truly pathetic."

Everyone nodded, remembering the lustrous dark curtains that used to swing from his head with envy. Most of them had fathers that would beat them should they have deigned to pursue this outward 'rebelliousness,' and served to strengthen Mitsui's black reputation.

Mitsui bridled at the other's maternal, clucking airs. He pronounced no affiliation with this band, apart from an offense that one of his group had committed in their territory, long ago. And the leader, this pompous boy of seventeen, maybe eighteen, had the gall to speak to him as if his very existence, and the safe conveyance of his whole being throughout the ages, was owed to this 'lifestyle' that they all conformed to –

Mitsui snorted. They were good-for-nothings, only looking to stir up some amusement for themselves by picking upon the first 'celebrity' they ever had ties with. If they couldn't have the same attention that basketball had brought the Shohoku team, and by extension Mitsui, they would bring him back down and extinguish this irksome reminder of their dismal, empty lives.

He knew this, because he recognised his past self in their arrogant stance and glowering intimidation. Mitsui tried in vain to stifle the rising distaste in his chest.

"Hey. Hey," He called at the tall rake. The fellow threw over a baleful glare. "I can see your boss likes to act. You should form a drama club. You three can be the ugly sisters" – Mitsui pointed at the triplet of stocky, soundless boys on the left – "that one can be the queen with the withering beauty, you with your moustache can be the groom she is having a fling with, and your boss can be the fat, drunk king." Mitsui looked back at the tall rake. "Of course, have you figured out that the king has made you his jester?"

The king raised his fists and roared, but was cut off by a sudden fit of coughing. The others of his court hung back uncertainly as he slapped his knees, trying to regain his breath. Mitsui remained in the exact same spot, about half a classroom's length away from them, battling the urge to smile, lest they should take a sudden dislike to his teeth in the ensuing storm. It hadn't been wise to rile them up so, but he couldn't resist, and he would have his fun if he was going to suffer either way.

The king raised truly moistened eyes to him now. "You will pay, Mitsui. We will finish this business right now, and you will not be walking away. Let's see your shooting skills save y…"

The focus of the other party shifted visibly, and the words dried in the leader's mouth. Mitsui became aware of a soft tapping of footsteps. It stopped abreast of him, and there was a thud of a bag that was not his dropping to the ground.

"Hooligans," he heard a female voice say.

Mitsui was forced to look obliquely at the new entrant, and could not, given all the time of the world, think of anything to say.

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 **I don't know where else to reply to you guys' kind reviews...**

Emily: thank you very much. I hope you found the continuation of the story much to your liking!

Micchy lover: that's fantastic, I'm so glad you like this particular Mit-chi story! We have to support each other in our love for this unruly boy, _heh heh_.

Lubljanka007: thank you for your review! I really do appreciate your pointing out the technical aspects. I hope to always improve and bring more stories. Another SD one might be on the way... ;)

Guest: I see you've reached all the way to the end, aah! It makes me happy that you enjoyed this story :) I am definitely working on another one. And my words are far from 'advanced,' really. I just tend to be mindful in how to present the characters and mood in each scene. We're all works-in-progress so there's always more to learn!


	2. Chapter 2

At this juncture, it would be wise for the reader to recap what we know about our main character, Mitsui Hisashi. At this particular summer, he was drawing to the end of his last year at Shohoku High. Having come back to the basketball team in a most spectacular manner, drawn by a mingled scorn and yearning jealousy of the rapidly ascending club, he cut off all ties with bad company as he chopped off his locks, and pitched in with the shooting skills that had distinguished him as MVP in earlier years. They had proven extremely useful in the Inter Highs, and, contrary to what the king had said, Mitsui was once again embraced by the sport which he had firmly believed was forever barred to him.

Of the old Mitsui, only the dogged tenacity – on which his bad reputation was firmly built on, because of one incident where he had intervened between the then-reigning delinquent king and an honest mailman – remained. That, and his loyal gang, made up of juveniles ostracized for their thuggish appearances and rough mannerisms.

Contrary to a large part of the regular student population, the summer holidays were not a time of rest for the basketball team. With the conclusion of the championships, they were continuing to train at least three times a week for the winter season. Akagi was deliberating over whom the baton of leadership should be passed to once he left high school, in what would be a more than honourable discharge, and he would drive a hard task of his successor, especially with the recent triumphs in mind.

As such, Mitsui knew he would be occupied at least to this extent for this break – a great improvement over the recent past, which consisted of picking on neighbourhood runts, trying to avoid the second-smoke from his friends (one of the lasting vanities of the fallen middle school player), and generally taking up space without good reason or purpose. It wasn't a period of life to be proud of, so Mitsui fell to the new activity with refreshed gusto and energy, and was gratified to see himself improve.

It was at one of the early trainings after he rejoined the team, when everyone had been very focused on the Kanagawa tournaments, that something that otherwise would have been unremarkable stood out. The weather at that time was not as warm as the present moment. Nevertheless, the smell of hard work, copious perspiration mingled with the slight acrid scent of the basketballs, accompanied the echoing sounds of dribbling and rubber-soled screeches.

The chamber of the court was as sacred to the team as a church to the faithful. Mitsui reveled in the machinations of their drills and movements, and especially the gratifying swish of the net with every goal. There was little if no talk in this vault. The flying orange spheres spoke of synchrony and symphony, and the waterfalls of sweat and the hush of expelled breath sounded to him as serene as a brook rushing through a twilit forest.

They were practicing a box-on-one formation in a game setting, when some disturbance by the gym doors arose. The strategy ended badly, according to Akagi, who accepted nothing less than paragon, and they gathered to the bench for a water break before he would expound on the exercise. All of them were panting fit to burst, and were at a loss for words for a full minute.

It was into this lull that a girl entered through the gym doors, which had been pushed ajar. She struggled with a full bucket of water, with a mop clamped under the other elbow, looking well foolish because that arm was strapped across her chest, fingers to collar, in an elevated arm sling made out of a neatly folded bandage.

For a second, Mitsui thought that he should go over and help her, but then Ayako and Haruko accosted her from the other side of the doors. The girl shook her head, but Ayako took the bucket from her and carried it towards the raised stage area at the far end of the hall, forcing her to trot in her footsteps.

"I was supposed to clean up today," Sakuragi said. This freshman was tall, solid, and endowed with a crown of striking red hair that gleamed in the light – a crown that could offer the most spectacular headbutts. As Haruko came closer, he turned to her as if attracted by a magnet, smiling helplessly.

She greeted them and set down a small bag on the bench. "I know everyone is training very hard, so I brought some granola bars for you to charge up. Sakuragi-kun, you are always hungry after training." Haruko was the sweetest, gentlest creature, and her voice was as lilting as any little songbird's. Her skin was fair, her bob of ebony hair as soft as silk, and her eyes shone with a bright and artless light.

"Haruko-chan!" Sakuragi immediately seized a couple of the offerings. "You can cook so well," he said through his stuffed mouth, trying to grin at the same time, which gave him a distended, clown-ish appearance.

Haruko laughed behind a raised hand.

"I can bake a little," she admitted.

Akagi approached, towering more than six feet tall, and boxed Sakuragi on the head.

"No eating on the court!" He pointed at the crumbs that Sakuragi had sprayed onto the ground as he whipped the bag of food out of reach. "Clean that up now. And no more for you."

Sakuragi got onto his knees and grumbled that it was impossible that Akagi was related to Haruko, at which the former had no compunction in boxing him again so that Sakuragi glared peevishly at the offending bits of fruit and nut scattered on the hardwood.

"Haruko-san, what was Ayako doing?" Miyagi asked.

The boy had his hooded eyes fixed on the manager as she walked back towards them, and he brushed two hands through his high fade, fixing his dark curls into place. Of those present, he probably knew what Mitsui had been through best, being quite a fighter himself. A diamond stud winked from one of his earlobes.

"She's telling Kasumi-chan how to clean the gym. Kasumi has been told to clean the premises," Haruko explained. A few freshmen acknowledged that they recognised her by her injury, but none of them besides Haruko knew her well.

Ayako joined them presently, the full-figured second year team manager. She wore her usual snapback cap with her long curly hair tucked back into a ponytail.

"Sakuragi, you will not have cleaning duty today," she said.

"That's work for team members, no?" Mitsui remarked. "And she is injured."

With reasonable dexterity, however, Kasumi was now swiping the ground vigorously, leveraging the top of the mop's handle with a couple of fingers of her injured limb. She was fully concentrated on her work, her eyes resolutely downcast.

"What's wrong with her arm?" Sakuragi piped up, still on all fours on the ground.

Miyagi whapped him sideways, quick as a viper. "Rude, Hanamichi."

Ayako nodded with approval, for her stiff clipboard was out of hand's reach at that moment, and Miyagi grinned without restraint.

 _Disgusting, this Ryouta_ , Mitsui thought. He was obviously besotted.

"It was an honest question," Sakuragi said petulantly, as he rubbed his head, "Ryo-chan, don't be too careless with this _tensai_ or Shohoku will definitely lose without this _secret weapon_." – which earned him another resolute whack.

"For a few weeks, Kasumi will take over these duties as detention," Ayako said, ignoring the ruckus.

There were glances of surprise exchanged between the boys, while Haruko twitched in discomfort at their apparent curiosity.

Mitsui set down his Pocari Sweat. "What did she…"

But Akagi cut through the conversation with a rallying call, and Kasumi was put aside for the moment as training resumed.


	3. Chapter 3

Now, several weeks after, can we blame Mitsui for being rendered speechless by the unsanctioned appearance of this unknown little sweep? How strange that certain persons can be made relevant in one's life in a very uncalled-for and circumstantial manner. The fate that had been about to befall Mitsui as a result of his audacious and unwise remarks was put on hold.

Neither of the original parties knew how to react to the sudden inclusion of a member of that fair sex, who gave no indication that she would be hurrying from the scene, her fragile gaze averted from whatever unconscionable acts that would ensue. Instead, she stood as if her feet had deliberately planted themselves in that solid stance, demanding a part in the play.

Mitsui himself, on whose side Kasumi seemed to be, had no clear knowledge of her intentions. Her whispered opening had hardly been audible. The leader roused now; the king rearing to his full height, lungs once against robust. He plucked a cigarette from the rake's fingers, and indicated for it to be lighted in a show of languid and jovial camaraderie. But Kasumi would not give him the pleasure of completing his theatrics.

"What I dislike more than hooligans," she muttered, loud enough for everyone to hear, "are hooligans who are blocking my road home."

She said this as if she were noting that a light drizzle had stopped, or that the cat had run out of water. Her blue school vest hung upon her unbuttoned, tie askew, as disheveled as the worst of them, and that one hand was bound with a bandage down to the wrist. The other held a long weapon wrapped in dark fabric.

The fire in the king's eyes rekindled, and he made the end of his cigarette glow cherry-red.

"I see, Mitsui. You have lost your balls. You have gone and gotten yourself this bitch of a guard dog."

His gang laughed. Then the rasp of wood on bone, and a conversational but very frigid tone, cut through their mirth.

"This bitch–" Their eyes flew to Kasumi as she glided the wooden sword out of its ivory sheath. "–can speak for herself."

The practice weapon was almost as long as she was tall, so she drew it crosswise in front of her as she raised its tip out and up into the sky.

"This bitch, has black belts in two martial arts."

She trailed her eyes languorously down the mahogany length of the sword, ignoring her audience.

"This bitch, is the granddaughter of Kinjo Tai, the infamous Red Dragoness of Kanagawa district."

Kasumi arced the _bokuto_ down with controlled and excruciating slowness, where it came to rest bisecting the view of her face and pointing straight towards the throat of the king.

"I, whom you call a bitch, will crack your skulls open before you touch either one of us."

All that could be heard after the soliloquy to end all soliloquys was quiet falling down upon the scene, and then a _whoosh_ as a summer gust rushed against the outer walls of the apartment houses on one side, sending the wind funneling mightily down the street.

The leaves whirred violently, set a-dancing and -waving like cheering spectators over their heads, and the gaze of everyone present could not help but be drawn by the snap of the pleated skirt around Kasumi's thighs, whilst the girl herself refused to bat an eyelid, trapping the king in her stare. She looked on without hatred, or disgust, or any sort of distinguishing emotion, and her frank remove and lack of abashment rather unsettled the enemy lines.

In a quick glance, Mitsui saw how Kasumi's eyes, where the sunshine hit her face, melted into gold-tinged chocolate, and the tendrils of hair that had escaped her tousled bun floated around her cheeks; any sense of apprehension at his fate, if fate it could still be called, had vanished, replaced by a current of buoyant exhilaration. If it had been any way appropriate, he would have broken into whole-hearted and enthusiastic applause.

As better became the situation, Mitsui flicked his calm gaze back to the leader.

"You would have her on your side, too, y'know," he said blandly.

His unexpected companion suddenly broke into a savage smile, and the blast of a horn rent the thrumming air like a portend and response.

Everyone else but the petite sword-bearer jumped at least a foot into the air, and the king's men were scattered like so many bowling pins as a hefty rover burst through their ranks, coming to a jarring stop inches from Mitsui, who had likewise flung himself out of its way.

Kasumi's bag sailed through the front window, and she wrenched the back door open.

"Get in, Akiyama," the driver, a pimple-faced youth, shouted. "You're the worst! Father will kill me if I don't manage to get the car back in the next five minutes."

Kasumi leapt inside, saying, "Stop whining, Seishiro. He won't find out."

"I'll keep whining as long as you keep calling me to do these things," he retorted, banging the steering wheel. "Is that your brother's _bokuto_? Look, if he sees that you're playing with it – Father will be ten times fiercer if he knows I took the car without permission."

Kasumi patted her friend's head soothingly before he could swat her hand away.

"Thank you, Sei-chan. You know I would be dead if it weren't for you."

"Is your friend coming or not?" Seishiro grumbled.

Kasumi turned to Mitsui, who had been watching the swift and almost practised argument occur between the two, quite speechless.

"Are you ready to make your grand exit?" she asked, and one side of her little mouth twitched. She held out her left hand.

"Hit it. Let's get the hell out."

Mitsui grabbed her wrist, jumped inside, and they left the small picturesque side street and the so many flaccid persons who stared at the back of the vanishing vehicle with a sense of wonder and some other, deeper, stirrings of the heart.


	4. Chapter 4

It turned out that Seishiro lived merely two streets away from the fateful side road. The car and clandestine driver were safely ensconced within the property without anyone the wiser, for the engine had sufficient time to cool completely for when Seishiro's father came home from work in the distant evening.

If things were really as they seemed, let's not think that Seishiro can be blamed for begrudging Kasumi his help. He had responded as readily as any friend is unable to unless they have some sort of practice with sudden phone calls and hasty, usually time-sensitive, requests, and an undemanding character of the sort that is content with a grateful hug and heartfelt promise of a meal of good _nigirizushi_.

Mitsui and the girl then darted out of the neighbourhood and emerged on a row lined with shops, at the end of which stood a train station. Some cheerful clouds scudded overhead through the power-lines, and the yeasty smell from a bakery lent Mitsui a sense of well-being. Rationally, he knew that his enemies were far from appeased, but the passers-by bustling away at their trifling daily activities restored a sense of normalcy.

"Where are you going, Mitsui-san?" Kasumi queried.

She walked along with the kendo sword held unthreateningly in one hand, and the compact book bag in the other. She had not had the time to re-tie her hair, but her vest was now fully buttoned and her skirt at a more appropriate knee-length.

"Nowhere in particular," Mitsui admitted. If he wasn't at training or with his mates, he too led an unassuming schedule; he had had few avocations besides professional idling and basketball, and he had not found a summer job for what remained of the school break.

"Well, I'm heading for the station. My brother will be needing his sword. I'm already late, gosh," Kasumi said, peering at the clock set above the sign of the station across the road. They drew to a stop at the red pedestrian light.

"Um, do you want to, I mean, are you free, maybe… to have a drink or something?" Mitsui tripped over his words.

The half-formed notion in his mind was that he wanted to know more about his mysterious accomplice, but he was all too aware that such a proffer might too easily come across as a straightforward romantic advance. Although he was disinterested in the many boons and banes of romance, the climate of the school necessitated that he become aware of this pastime, to some degree, that many of his schoolmates were completely occupied with.

It wasn't as if he hadn't had his part of this game of love, either; girls found his lucid attitude, fierce black brows, and a more recently earned scar at his chin alluring. In general, the basketball team had been garnering attention, as will a group of successful, healthy young men in the arena of athletic prowess, courage, and determination.

He needn't have worried, however, for Kasumi continued to search the commuter crowd insouciantly.

"I want to thank you," Mitsui rallied, feeling more composed, "for giving me your help, uh…" – the stalwart young lad had forgotten her name.

Kasumi turned to him and bowed slightly. "Ah, pleased to meet you. Akiyama Kasumi, _yoroshiku onegaishimasu_."

"Akiyama-san," Mitsui acknowledged, after introducing himself rapidly in the same fashion. He followed her across the intersection as the light turned green.

"Thank for your kind offer, but I have work after this errand, so I'm afraid I must decline. Besides, Sei-chan probably deserves that free drink much more than me," said Kasumi. She stepped aside to let a man wheel his bicycle towards the station gantry, then smiled up at Mitsui. "But let us shake hands like the Americans do. _We finished it up beautifully, didn't we?_ "

Her last sentence was spoken in English, with a perfect American accent.

" _We did_ ," Mitsui replied, startled, but not to be found wanting. They shook on it, but something… there was something _off_ –

A surmounting shock travelled from where he had taken her extended hand. Mitsui looked down, and saw plainly, for the first time, that her bound appendage lacked its last two fingers.

Rather, to give the reader a better picture: each of them distinctly lacked several of their digits, such that they were foreshortened stumps.

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It may be gathered from all that we have observed that Kasumi came across, in general, as a rather wild and even errant young student. In fact, she had used that to the greatest advantage. Earlier, coming from the detention of cleaning the gym, she had caught sight of Mitsui's figure disappearing down the way. As felt natural to her, Kasumi trailed after him, drawn by the pleasantly lazy manner he drifted along, trapped in a bubble of his own thoughts and owning the rhythm of his tread.

The image of a lone figure, espied through the waving long stems of the field on the right, its shadow thrown on the pale pink cement of walls glowing in the afternoon sun, suddenly confronted by frigid ranks, cut a striking impression with her. Kasumi hid herself in a little turn-off, still able to hear their exchange, and immediately began to adjust her appearance, tugging at her hair and tie, folding her skirt, and pulling the hem of her blouse out of its elastic band; she also made a clandestine call.

At the prime moment, she strode into view in a perfect imitation of the rough high school girls she had all too much experience with during her middle school days. Kasumi knew her thin act could be pierced by mere suspicion, and so fancied herself as the very embodiment of a ruffian completely self-confident, and unafraid of any and all opposition. She didn't think about what would ensue if things should break into an actual altercation – that would be failure.

As she lowered the _bokuto_ , Kasumi made sure to show their adversaries, very clearly, her disfigured hand. Let them imagine what they would about her missing fingers, her vulgarities, and her professed reputation; and they did, long enough that Seishiro could interrupt their exchange and facilitate her and Mitsui's escape.

And yet, that didn't mean that Kasumi was ready for anyone else to acknowledge that mutilation of hers. The handshake had been a break at humour, for she felt some guilt at rejecting his earnest treat, and, without thinking, she had stuck out that vulnerable injury.

After a moment, in which it felt as if her head had been plunged into an ice-cold bath, Kasumi plucked her hand from Mitsui's, uttered a goodbye, and fled up the station steps with the sword slapping against her legs.

"Wait!" she heard. "Is… is it true, granddaughter of the Red Dragoness? Which martial arts have you mastered?"

Kasumi's steps faltered. She turned back whence she had come, her cheeks flushed.

Mitsui grinned up at her, his bag slung back on one shoulder, his hands stuck roguishly into his pockets, and rocking back on his heels as if nothing untoward had passed between them. He was at least a head taller than her; yet, now, he came across in the very picture of a nonchalant child, earnestly waiting for an answer to some unimportant but significant question of the workings of the world.

An image of how they would have looked, on that narrow nameless road, standing side-by-side against the dark king's horde, flashed across Kasumi's mind; and it was a good picture.

Kasumi raised the remaining whole fingers of that hand.

"Of the three things I said, one was not true. Good day, Mitsui-san."

She smiled and left.


	5. Chapter 5

Mitsui felt a prick of shock as he slid open the gym doors. He had expected the hall to be empty, but here he was presented with the sight of Rukawa and Kasumi, conversing softly together in between the two basketball courts.

After an almost imperceptible pause, Mitsui shut the doors behind him and paced towards them, feigning nonchalance towards the double unexpectedness enacted by his two acquaintances. It was true, Rukawa probably knew her; this wasn't a surprise, for they were both freshmen. But the inconsistency with Rukawa's closely taciturn attitude, to find him speaking in what seemed like an extended manner to someone else, and a girl, no less; when all Mitsui could imagine ran through his brain was basketball and a general, consistent contempt and shortness for anyone else who had no part in the sport. He imagined that the proverbial multitudes of admiring females in Shohoku alone would have produced in Rukawa a general aversion to their shallow company.

Contrary to his predictions, it seemed that the junior was perfectly civil, even talkative, with Kasumi now. He burned to know what had passed between them.

Mitsui dribbled the ball he held, producing echoes that could not be ignored.

"Mitsui-san," Kasumi greeted him.

Rukawa nodded mutely, the whites of his eyes gleaming from under the mop of his hair. He had a pair of almost feminine eyes, fringed by long lashes.

"Rukawa-kun was telling me about how he's leaving for the All Japan Junior camp this weekend," said she.

Mitsui looked with surprise at the ace.

"Really? Last time I heard, the results hadn't been confirmed. Congratulations." He gave Rukawa a rap on the shoulder. "We'll be depending on you. Don't let Kanagawa down."

"You know I won't," Rukawa replied.

"That, I do."

"Are you here to practise more shooting? Because you don't need any more practice for your three-pointers, but more _here_ and _here_." Rukawa pointed first to his legs, then his head.

Mitsui knew exactly what he meant, and his first gut instinct was to take up arms against the insult to his endurance and strategic plays; but Rukawa's factual, emotionless observation was impossible to construe as rude.

It remained savagely delivered, nonetheless.

"No one can make a person take his own bitter medicine quite like you, Rukawa," Kasumi laughed. She picked up her broom and mop. "I'd better get cleaning, then."

"Akiyama-san, you're early too," Mitsui said.

"Got to run somewhere before your training ends today," she explained, without explaining at all.

She was dressed in jeans and a wide-necked chrysanthemum-yellow top, which showed off her collarbones, and a very delicate gold choker that complimented her outfit. Mitsui wondered why she was so well-attired, if she had an important rendezvous.

"How long do you have to play janitor?" he asked.

Kasumi waved off the hands that he, and Rukawa – by constitution with considerably less ardour, had intended to take the water bucket.

"As long as the floor doesn't wash itself, or the school has sports clubs… and the radio keeps giving the wrong weather forecast and it rains tomorrow," she said over her shoulder, shuffling away. "I don't know. Don't let me bother you."

The rest of the basketball team clattered through the entryway as the clock struck one, filling the gym with their bustle.

"Hey, how do you know Akiyama? Is she in your class?" Mitsui asked as they went to meet the team. He felt slightly peeved at their too-short exchange.

"She helped me with English last term," Rukawa replied curtly. That had, in fact, been the only subject he had passed in the semester exams.

The team did warm-ups and basic stationary and dynamic drills as Kasumi industriously and systematically worked around the upper catwalk that ringed the facility, occasionally disappearing to exchange the water in her pail. And when Mitsui happened to look up during one of their rounds, as he waited for the ball from his antecedent, she was already nowhere to be found.

* * *

"I know where we should go," Haruko said to the group as they exited the school grounds. "I haven't had the chance to go, but Kasumi-chan recommended a café not too far away from here. She's familiar with the owners. Rukawa-kun, do you enjoy American food? Since you had thought of going to America to further your basketball…"

The company of students, consisting the starters of the season and Kogure – the latter having sneaked off from cram class for the entrance exams, and Sakuragi indisposed by his back injury – was rather subdued.

"It doesn't matter." Rukawa shrugged non-committally.

"As long as we don't go back to that damned _tsukemen_ place," Miyagi butted in. "Just for that, I'm thankful that bottomless machine Hanamichi is gone."

"Oh, right! I made a get well soon card for Sakuragi-kun, all of you guys can sign it later. I think it will speed up his recovery to know that we'll be waiting for him," Haruko piped up.

Mitsui laughed. "I know exactly what to write that will light a fire under his ass, alright."

"Mmm. What about 'Rukawa surpasses even Ryouta to become the next captain'?" Ayako said.

"I like that," Miyagi said, pleased with her wit, while Rukawa had no reaction at all.

"That won't quicken his recovery, it'll destroy whatever compunction that's keeping him at that old-people 'peaceful beachside convalescent cottage,'" Mitsui said.

"Don't make fun of Sakuragi," Haruko demurred. "His player's spirit is very strong, and that is why he's willing to go through this indefinite period of rehabilitation."

"The need came into the world to make fun of Sakuragi when he first called himself _tensai_ ," Mitsui interjected.

"We blight his name because we know he's too thick-headed to know that it is true," Miyagi said fondly. "Don't worry, Haruko-san, that ragbag _tensai_ of yours won't die so easily. He said so himself."


	6. Chapter 6

The pavement was speckled with a shifting confetti of afternoon light as they poured out onto the moderately busy square outside of the train station. Following Haruko's directions, they left the more crowded storefronts facing the commuter interchange, dodging an ice-cream peddler and a small camera crew in front of a modest church with a fountain, and wandered down the pedestrian path down a road lined with less restive shops.

"Ah, is that Akiyama-san?" Ayako pointed with surprise to a van idling in front a florist.

Kasumi was speaking with a delivery man, who sipped gingerly from a glass mug. A consignment of goods lay at the curb by their feet. Kasumi caught sight of them by a casual glance, then gave a double take. She re-acquired the cup, nodded politely several times, and made her farewells to the worker before he rattled off in his vehicle.

"Any of you care for a cup of coffee?" she asked without preamble as they drew near. "I have some extra in the machine."

"No, thank you, Kasumi-chan. We were going to that small western style restaurant you told me about," Haruko explained. "I thought, since Rukawa-kun would be leaving of his camp, to – we could take the chance and try some American cuisine together."

Kasumi nodded cordially. "Oh, Haruko-chan, you look beautiful in this dress. The purple brings out your eyes very much."

She delivered her compliment with a hand on her friend's elbow, spinning her around so that her dress flared out prettily. Haruko blushed.

"And Ayako-san, you are stylish and sophisticated as always, as an upperclassman should be."

Unrestricted by school rules during the holidays, Ayako had taken the liberty to don a utilitarian but spruce tan-coloured A-line dress, which she thought made her look more svelte. Miyagi turned adoring eyes to Ayako as she smoothed her curls behind one ear, muttering her thanks.

Mitsui noticed none of this, only having eyes for Kasumi as he felt very much that hers was a performance so elaborately natural that one had to accept it wholly, lest he doubt the guilelessness of his counterparts. He felt a little disappointment, too, that she had not given some special indication of his presence, given their somewhat rollicking acquaintance.

But then, Mitsui rationalised, what cause had she to speak to the other guys whom she did not know? She was only acting with modesty; he wouldn't know how to think if she had the freedom of character to engage, with the same warmness, people with whom the facility of her detention was the only link.

"Does Akiyama-san work here?" Mitsui asked, and was gratified when she looked at him.

Her elfin face was heart-shaped and unblemished, with a nose formed like a teardrop. Her brown eyes were fringed by long, delicate lashes, and he fancied gold dust glimmering in their depths.

"Yes," Kasumi replied, "My mother is inside, discussing some floral arrangements for a traditional wedding."

They followed her gaze past the glass displays, overflowing with a thousand different arrangements and blooms, to the large cashier station, where a handsome woman with gerberas in her upswept hair chattered to a couple.

"They are insistent on _ikebana_ , and Mother is trying to explain that we specialize in rather more enthusiastic modern compositions," Kasumi said, a small smile on her lips.

"I didn't know Kasumi-chan worked at a flower shop," Haruko said, admiring a bouquet of tulips.

Kasumi pointed to the lot to the right of the florist.

"We own this laundry shop too."

"A laundry shop," Kogure pondered. He was the good-looking, bespectacled senior vice-captain who was as intelligent as Akagi. "Is it good for business?"

Kasumi considered his question.

"Are we talking annual profit margin, business longevity, or labour savings?" she laughed.

Kogure shrugged, smiling. "Just curious."

Kasumi nodded. "It's quite low-maintenance. There's a healthy population of lone _otaku_ hereabouts, in any case."

Miyagi flicked his nose in revulsion. "Do they all have greasy hair, skittering eyes, and a pair of female panties wadded up somewhere in their laundry?"

Ayako frowned.

"No, no, Miyagi-san. I just talk to them," Kasumi said. "A lot of them are quite normal, and just can't afford a machine. Maybe I shouldn't have used that negative term."

Kasumi crouched and deftly balanced two bags of fertilizer on one shoulder. "Ah, thank you for your help," she said as Mitsui and Kogure hastened to lay claim over the remaining. The former felt a little jolt at the unexpected heftiness of the hessian sacks.

Kasumi tapped her chin as they started to walk.

"If I might say so, you guys are a type of _basuketto boru otaku_ , yes?"

"Fat chance, Akiyama-san," Miyagi repudiated, whipping off his John Lennon sunglasses.

They continued to debate back-and-forth about the characteristics of this species of people, Kasumi striving to balk the various negative connotations that society had so chosen to attribute to this inclination toward obsessive interests, and alleviate her opposition's misgivings. She took them through a back door in the laundry shop, which opened into an open-air garden of sorts, joining the two posterior spaces of the businesses.

"Nice garden," Mitsui said, giving a whistle. He was surprised to find this serene patch in the middle of civilization, for cities did not often afford the luxury of space; and inhabited by two cats, too.

Haruko at once dropped into a crouch to pet the friendly animals, which wended between her legs in a flurry of throaty purrs and twining tails.

"Kasumi-chan, tell them how this came to be," she said. "It's a good story."

Kasumi nodded accommodatingly. "The previous owner had big dreams of turning this property into a cookhouse, but the money all went to knocking down the back of the building and reconstruction. At least his dogs got a nice space to run about in, I guess. He had five high pedigree creatures, and each cost as much as a sub-contractor."

Kogure chuckled. Kasumi's openness and affability was changing all their pre-formed views about her, especially since it came forth without expectation – from this silent, overlooked little detentionee, a perpetual shadow in the peripheries of their action, ostracized by her unrevealed but unmistakably delinquent actions. Although she talked about experiences of her own, she made sure not to prattle on, and answered with the most amusing anecdotes that they could desire so it wouldn't seem that she indulged in sycophantic arrogance.

"I remember seeing their dog mansion and everything, right in that corner, with heating and an artificial chimney, and thinking that three of me and an unfussy cat or two could have lived inside comfortably."

"No," Miyagi said lowly.

"Yes," Kasumi said, nodding gravely.

"There are people who spend so much on glorified fleabags?" he shot back.

"And there are others who spend so much on branded clothing," Kasumi commented, pretending to look pointedly away from Miyagi's refined outfit. He saw everyone else appraising him with sudden interest, and clapped his hands defensively over the various labels of Prada and Moschino on his trousers and bomber jacket.

"They were on sale!" he protested. "To each his own."

"To each his own," Kasumi acceded somberly as Mitsui gave a hoot of laughter. She gestured to a simple metal structure strapped over with green tarpaulin standing broadside to them, fitted with a solid but rusting metal door.

"Alas," she sighed. "The last owner never saw the need to donate his dogs' quarters to a more charitable cause. Instead of that veritable stately mansion, I can only present this humble shelter, which grows no more than potted her–"

There came a sudden shriek from within the shed, startling all of them, and a black object hurtled out through a window.


	7. Chapter 7

Mitsui, who stood just behind Kasumi, threw out an arm and dragged her down in an explosion of strength. The thing missed their heads by a handbreadth. Miyagi shielded Ayako behind him, while Kogure had his head hidden under his load. Haruko, who was quite unmolested, gasped behind two hands loud enough for everyone.

Rukawa looked on impassively, his arms crossed, as the offensive culprit continued to flap and swoop above Mitsui and Kasumi.

"A crow," he remarked, tracking the animal with his gaze as it jabbered on raucously, stabbing its hefty beak into the air and beating its wings with audible heaves.

"It's mad!" Mitsui said, trying to swat the crow away, which only increased the pitch of its protests.

"Blagden!" Kasumi called in English. " _Alright, alright. I forgot to introduce you. This shed is much more than for growing herbs, yes._ "

There was a killing silence; all of them understood the language well enough, but the combined, unforeseen disturbance in the mortally vehement bird, and Kasumi's dialogue with it, rendered them incapable of breaching the unusual situation.

Mitsui became quite aware of Kasumi, for when he'd intended to protect her, their limbs had become tangled in their fall; she was now splayed in his lap, the fertilizer bags scattered around them, one split open over the grass.

Her hair brushed his face as she straightened to placate the angry bird, simultaneously lost in glee as she was unable to hold back the giggles bubbling from her throat.

"Stop, Blagden," Kasumi managed, " _You're not endearing yourself much to my friends at the moment._ "

She tossed Mitsui a conspiratorial grin, which failed spectacularly when she realised where exactly her weight rested on, and became aware of the incredible awkwardness that must come with intimate contact with an associate of the opposite sex without a scrap of intent or pleasure.

Giving a violent start, Kasumi scrambled to her feet as her cheeks suffused with colour.

"Ah, I should get off Mitsui-san," she valiantly offered him a hand and a joke, "or his knee will be in danger again."

Continuing the charade, Mitsui choked up a laugh. He recovered his stance without assistance, and apologized for the spilt compost. His own face reflected a scarlet embarrassment, and he knew not where to look nor place his hands. Here he saw a brown smudge along Kasumi's ankle, there he remembered how tightly the clip of her golden choker had been fastened, and the warmth of her hand on his knee, and each nervous, startling recollection served to heighten his discomfiture and the distinct sense that they had come together much too prematurely.

Kasumi avoided his eyes.

"It's not you fault," she assured him.

"Kasumi-chan, are you okay?" Haruko asked anxiously.

Blagden, the crow, had perched on the roof of the shed. It cocked its head to survey them with a small gleaming eye, and clucked as if with laughter at Mitsui's predicament.

"I think it knows what we're talking about," Miyagi commented suspiciously; although, frankly, he was quite impressed by the machismo of the diminutive creature. He proceeded to call insults at it with condescending deliberation. Ayako swiftly hushed him with a disapproving _humph_.

Mitsui glared at it; he would have shot the infernal thing if there was a catapult on hand, by God. That preening sidestep with ruffled feathers gave the sooty bird an especially conceited, smug appearance.

"Yes, I'm fine, Haruko-chan."

Kasumi dusted the seat of her jeans and darted over to the shed door, as a sudden thought seized her. There she uttered an exasperated cry.

"What's happened now?" Kogure asked.

"Blagden!" Kasumi stalked back to the crow, which hopped back speedily out-of-reach. " _Where have you taken the shed key_?"

The bird yapped like an impertinent two-legged dog, and took off for a thin tree at the edge of the property. It circled around the trunk once, twice, before drifting onto the thinnest branch on outstretched wings.

"It's up there," Rukawa intoned. The key glimmered faintly as it twisted from its wooden hook forty feet overhead.

"It understands us for sure," Miyagi announced triumphantly, before he remembered to be infuriated. "I mean, you bastard chicken!"

"Oh no." Haruko looked over at Kasumi. The latter shook her head in exasperation at Haruko's unasked question.

"No, there aren't any more. The third 'spare' key is hanging up on that branch. Blagden, _you won't be getting any dinner today!_ "

"Oi, oi! _Bad boy, bad boy_ ," it cawed, before vanishing for good with a powerful flapping, the sparkly trinket left safely aloft at its last roost.

Mitsui began to laugh, unable to ignore the absurd humour of the situation. He returned Kasumi her knowing look, their awkwardness forgotten in the surmounting situation. "Why would you keep that blasted thing as a pet, for heaven's sake?"

"Blagden was almost killed by one of our cats. As we nursed him back to health indoors, he became as smart and insufferable as he is now." She shrugged helplessly. "I thought keeping the key under that big flowerpot was enough. Maybe he saw Mother hiding it."

"And it understands English?" Mitsui continued, with unabated incredulity.

Kasumi grimaced. "I wouldn't doubt him."

"Incredible," Ayako said with a shake of the head.

"Either way, we should concentrate on getting it back," Kogure pointed out sensibly.


	8. Chapter 8

The tree was too narrow and flimsy to support the weight of a person or a ladder, yet too tall that shaking it near the ground only produced the smallest of shivers at the principal branch, positioned too far from the enclosing walls to attempt a scaling from atop them, and the cats were too willful even if they were in the frame of mind to comprehend commands to 'fetch.'

They all mulled in various states of repose beneath the tree, with the exception of Rukawa, who squatted unsociably at a distant bed of plants, nearer to the back door of the laundry shop, his wide back an uncommunicative _tabula rasa_.

 _If I had something_ , Mitsui thought again, _I would snipe the damned bird and teach it a good le– wait, shoot_ …

"Shoot it!" he crowed excitedly. Mitsui rushed over to Rukawa, and now saw that the freshman was tossing a pebble in the air repeatedly from the palm of his hand.

The light tap that he performed to his temple would have infuriated Mitsui, even if it had not been accompanied by a snort which connoted 'long enough.' The latter, struggling to maintain a civil composure, snatched several pebbles from the soil, and the rock from Rukawa's palm, and ran back.

"It isn't any use even if we hit the key," Mitsui said, because the item bad been inserted onto an almost vertical offshoot. "We'll have to break the branch."

It took Mitsui, Miyagi, and Kogure thirteen pebbles to accomplish the job. The former had the pride of achieving the greatest number of strikes, as well as the final blow that sent the key plunging earthward like a precious stalactite.

"I can now tell my parents that basketball does have its uses," Miyagi remarked.

The group trooped over to the café as soon as the shed had been successfully unlocked, Kasumi insisting that only one of them – Miyagi – should remain with her to shift the consignment within.

Meanwhile, Ayako ordered enough drinks and snacks for the eight of them, and then some. Mitsui and Miyagi pondered over the menu as she did so, stumbling over the English words and culinary jargon. The _anglaise_ was definitely foreign, a _pan-seared filet of Haddock_ sounded vaguely marine – dock, was dock a species of animal? – and a _Bloody Mary_ confounded the entire table. Kogure suggested it might be a gimmick beverage for entertainment purposes, as it was only served in the night time from 7p.m.

The food had just arrived, served by a demure girl who nonetheless blushed when Mitsui accidentally touched her hand while receiving the utensils, when Miyagi and Kasumi arrived at the moss-touched gate that bordered the al fresco dining area.

A few fallen leaves swirled around their ankles as they came down the short brick path, and Mitsui saw the sunlight scatter like diamonds in Kasumi's loose hair as she moved.

"Ayako-chan." Miyagi rounded to the empty seat beside her, but did not sit. He produced a luxuriant bouquet from behind his back, a tall design of lilies and violets, and presented them to Ayako. "This–these are for you. Please accept them."

No, this wasn't a confession, but it came quite close. Ayako's mouth hung agape. Haruko pressed a hand to her mouth, and Kogure's eyes widened. Mitsui and Rukawa each raised an eyebrow.

If it had been in any other, less romantic setting, in the presence of peers a fraction less familiar, the bouquet would never have continued its blessed and purposeful existence. But the effortless beauty of the swaying foliage overhead, the light breeze running its fingers through their hair, the crisp intensity of the summer colours in sky and ground was wrong to disrupt.

No cruel blow came from Ayako's surprised lips, only a graceful and favourable acceptance. She complimented the interesting contrast of the elegant white trumpets with the full, rounded purple blossoms.

Mitsui caught Miyagi, glowing with contentment, exchange an almost imperceptible wink with Kasumi. The latter only gave a shadow of a smile as Ayako tried to hide her trembling hands under the bouquet.

"Haruko-chan."

The poor girl, who was so immersed in the shared feeling of camaraderie, and dazed by the thoroughly blatant and stylish manner that Miyagi had flourished the present, remained deaf.

"Haruko-chan," Kasumi sang, bending at the waist to pat her cheek.

"Huh?" Haruko jumped, and pretended that she hadn't been staring at Rukawa's large, masculine hands next to the gold-fringed teapot. "Y–yes, Kasumi-chan…"

"This," Kasumi said gently, placing a single red rose in her upturned palms, "is from an unnamed admirer, who thanks you for your constant caring attitude, and faith in the people around you." Mitsui thought Haruko was going to faint, by the way she turned so quickly from fair, to white, to red, upon perceiving the lovely bloom.

"I–this must be a mistake, I can't–it's not for me is it?" Haruko sputtered.

Kasumi sank into her chair, unable to hold back a smile. "It is. It's for Haruko-chan."

"No, I just –never thought that… do you suppose it's from a boy?" she whispered fiercely, turning her head so that her flaming cheeks were hidden from view.

"I think, whomever the person may be, Haruko-chan can be assured that she has an admirer who is able to see her true heart."

Haruko seemed to snap back to her senses, and presently recovered her cheerful disposition. "I must not be complacent. I will be happy to know that someone has taken the time to send me this flower, and not be so presumptuous as to assume that this kind person wants me to know who he is. Yes." She clenched her hands into small fists, firmly restored. She reached for a puff pastry. "Rukawa-kun, do you want a _kuro_ –a _kurowassan_?"

Kasumi politely asked Mitsui to pass the creamer for her tea. The only manner in which she returned to the topic was a light gibe at Rukawa, Mitsui, and Kogure. "Any of you free gentlemen have an especial _interest_? My mother would be happy to oblige. She insists it's much of the fashion nowadays, and women need something to _look_ at, and admire."

"We'll let you know when need arises," Kogure said in good humour.

"As will I," Mitsui said evenly. "If roses can improve my vertical, or daisies my shooting percentage."

Rukawa continued to consume his _crème brûlée_ , wrinkling his nose at the bitter crust.


	9. Chapter 9

Although there was no one around, Kasumi felt her face flood with warmth as she walked past that point of the upper catwalk. She gripped the cloth that she had completed cleaning the windows with and hastened on downstairs, determined to bury the embarrassing memory.

Earlier, during practice, the basketball team had been engaged in a full game, five a side. Anzai _sensei_ , with Ayako beside him, sat impassively on the bench. He was a fat, imperturbable man, although, if one could see the eyes hidden behind wrinkles and small eyeglasses, they would have been deeply impressed by their astuteness and keen alacrity.

Akagi, guarding the paint against Yasuda, roared for one of the freshmen to concentrate and think of a strategy to guard Miyagi. The latter was bent low, dribbling the ball with deftness, and slipped Iishi a sly smile.

From the catwalk, which offered her an obliterated view of the gym, Kasumi could see how Miyagi's team was crippling the captain's. Akagi was, arguably, the best centre forward in the district, and his height gave him an almost insuperable jumping and scoring ability under the basket. D seemed to be tight; Mitsui hemmed Rukawa into an unfavourable corner, with eyes fixed on another small forward. However, the rest of his team were overshadowed by the more experienced starters of the opposing party.

The play of the ball on the court was mesmerising to Kasumi. The lacquer of the hardwood reflected the uttered calls of the players, as they bounced commands and encouragements between themselves, and the dynamism in the spurts of energy, rivulets of sweat, and the swish of the net drew her eyes once again. She fancied that the more she watched the members on the court, an accompanying surge of athleticism and vitality suffused her own limbs.

A flurry of movement swept over the court as defense wavered on the ball.

Kasumi, words already crowded on her tongue, rushed to the railings and shouted, "V screen! Watch Number 11–"

The faces of those on the first level snapped towards her in a mixture of weariness and astonishment, and, in that moment, Miyagi seized the opportunity to roll the attack to the left. Rukawa shed Mitsui neatly in an impressive double-fake to receive the ball for an easy lay-up.

"Stupid, stupid," Kasumi muttered to herself as she jangled the ring of keys in her hand. A yellow afternoon light streamed in through the high windows ringing the cavernous gym, throwing soft rectangles across the gleaming floor.

She scanned the gym for anything to be put away, and espied one errant ball that had rolled under some stacked chairs against the wall, which had been taken out of storage for one purpose or the other. She eased the sphere out, cradled it against her side, and crossed the courts to the entranceway, her footsteps soft and delicate.

As they crossed one reddish backboard, however, they slowed, then stopped completely, seemingly compelled by an invisible force upon the owner. The ball came to life on that spotless court, spinning and drawing arcs, reverberating the gently floating dust motes with the flat and rhythmic sounds of its impact.

Kasumi removed her shoes and danced with the ball in her socks, not caring if she slipped, as long as she didn't mar the parquet. She did not know what period of time passed, marked only by the feeling of the ball leaving her fingers and soaring quietly through the air; the ring and rattle of the breakaway rim as it rebounded off the goal, as it often did. Not more than one was sunk into the basket, but it was a beautiful one nevertheless, popping the net straight back up through the rim after impact.

The day was cooling when Kasumi locked the gym up behind her. The ball she returned to the container in the club room, the keys to the elderly janitor at the cleaning shed. It felt a little like autumn as she made her way past the bicycle shed, out of the gates, and for the station.

The trains were absent of their usual freight of students returning from club activities, and the view outside the windows flashed past in a blur of gray buildings and slightly yellowed foliage.

She did not stop at Akiyama Florist's, but tripped into the family store a few doors down to buy two canned juices. After giving the indolent _shiba inu_ that rested on the threshold its usual head rub, Kasumi sped deeper into the neighbourhood.

Here, the houses became visibly more old-fashioned, water-stained, and characterised by flatter roofs as they marched closer to the river. An unexpected plot of grass was found here, containing a derelict, rudimentary playground, long bereft of the carefree cries of the young, and a towering structure of two water tanks – twin enormous, colourless humps set atop a jungle gym of once-white cement.

It was up this decaying edifice that Kasumi clambered without hesitation, by way of a black ladder that had flakes of rust coming off in her palms.


	10. Chapter 10

Mitsui kicked the base of the ladder, and rubbed dubiously at the residue on the metal bars. The ground where he stood was already cast into purple-blue shadows as the sun hastened to its resting place, while the water tanks, one hundred feet above him, blazed like ceramic heated in a furnace.

What was Kasumi doing up there? His mind had already considered all the possible surreptitious motives that she might have possessed – running away from work? Two drinks? For whom was the other? – simultaneously and hypocritically oblivious to his own furtive tracking.

He had accosted Anzai _sensei_ after practice, and they had spend a good amount of time debating the various merits of his staying in the basketball club for the Winter Cup, and beyond; the coach advised that he should not fail to concentrate upon his academics, too. At this point, however, tertiary education seemed pointless to Mitsui, for he did not know what to apply himself to.

In such a brooding state, Mitsui had wanted to clear the air above his head with some exercise, but the sound of a ball bouncing in the gym had discouraged him. He did not desire to meet or play with any of his teammates at that time, so he had turned to leave. Some kind of presentiment had caused him to glance over his shoulder before he left the premises of the facility, and, with surprise, he noted the slim figure of Kasumi hurrying on her way.

And that is how Mitsui was transported to this rickety ladder, cursing at every draft of wind that seemed to make the bars underneath his limbs tremble, and reconsidering every urge that had made him think this course of action was in any way without grievous danger and therefore acceptable to an underserving and normal person like him.

A trickle of relief entered Mitsui when he caught the final rung, but he paused as logic returned to him. The houses looked very small beneath his shoes, and he fancied he could see all the way back to Shohoku High with a turn of his head, that was how high aloft he was. What would meet him at the top? There was no quick way of escape if he was unwelcome. Should there be someone else with –

"About time, yes?"

Without warning, Kasumi's head popped into sight.

A bolt of shock impaled Mitsui, upsetting his already drumming pulse, and he almost let go of the rung. The girl leaned down and grabbed his collar as he jolted against the ladder. A belated vertigo seized him, and Mitsui clung to the metal as his vision swirled with pinwheels of gray.

"Come on, then," Kasumi said.

She took his hand and heaved with surprising strength.

"You're not afraid of heights," Mitsui grunted, feeling perspiration running down his chest.

He finally crawled to safety, well away from the edge, and sank to the ground, breathing heavily. Kasumi, resting neatly on her ankles on the roughened concrete, watched him for a moment before riffling through her bag.

"Here, drink this. It will settle your stomach." She tossed him a can of orange juice. "I used to be scared while coming up, too," she said, smoothing away strands of hair that the wind insistently pushed into her face.

"Really? Nah, you're not afraid of anything."

Mitsui tried to disguise the tremor in his fingers as he snapped the tab on the drink, and swallowed almost half of the sweet beverage at once. His hair gleamed a midnight blue, and the evening light gilded the chiseled muscles along his forearms.

"The sunset is worth it," Kasumi said. She looked over her shoulder, and stood. "Come on."

Mitsui hooked the can in one hand, rose to his feet, and the two of them followed the curve of the water tank into the bright face of the sinking sun. There was a knee-high parapet around this top platform, and nothing more. Kasumi walked right up to it and surveyed the almost indecipherable, burning vista.

The river flowed serenely past the fiery orb, unaffected by the flaming surface of its mirror-like waters. The taller structures of glass and metal of the metropolis area glittered coldly, human-mined stars of ruby sparks and fire. The roar of traffic was lost in the steady beat of wind, and only a clean and clear air pierced the lungs at this height, enhanced by the scent of mildew that drifted from the tanks at their backs.

"You gave it to her, didn't you?" Mitsui said, joining her at the edge. His body, where it was bathed in sunlight, was delightfully warm, and he no longer felt that dizzying fear tautening his shoulders.

Kasumi glanced at him.

"The rose," he insisted. "It wasn't a secret admirer of Haruko-chan's. It was you."

The crease on Kasumi's brow disappeared as comprehension came to her.

"No," she said. Mitsui stared at her in disbelief.

"Really?"

Kasumi nodded. "Is it so hard to believe, Mitsui-san?" she asked, squinting at him.

Mitsui ran a hand over his head. "Getting Haruko and Rukawa in the same place, suggesting that Miyagi surprise Ayako, thereby letting you present Haruko a gift that would make her seem popular. Anyone with eyes and a brain would know that you orchestrated everything."

"You make me sound oh so _very_ cunning when you describe things this way," Kasumi said, "but I can promise you, it was not me."

The shadows stretched, and the orange circle of the sun was fast disappearing among the streaming clouds at the horizon. The soft cawing of crows could be momentarily heard. They watched the twilight encroach, vignetting the sky with deepening blue. A countless number of things flashed through Mitsui's mind as they stood there over the world together, which shall go undescribed.

"I want to help out," Mitsui said suddenly.

Kasumi gave him a look of surprise. "Eh? You want to work at the flower shop?"

"Yes."

"Don't you have other things to do? I can think of a thousand things that would be more interesting than floristry, if I'm honest," Kasumi said.

"What else should I do, then?" Mitsui reflected, placing one foot on the parapet. "I know nothing besides basketball."

"That may be more truth than would be wise to admit," she said cheekily. "Rukawa mentioned that you guys were almost banned from the Nationals because of your _terrible_ grades."

"How do you know Rukawa?" Mitsui demanded, emboldened. The fact that she had been fully aware of his futilely furtive actions, and did not seem disinclined to his presence, seemed to construe an acceptance, if not amicability.

"I was asked to tutor him in English."

"No, you know… how do you talk to him?"

"Who, Rukawa?" Kasumi frowned in puzzlement. "We usually talk about the western world, I guess. I think it's no secret that he wants to make it big, and the NBA seems the way to go. He's quiet, but he does have a perfectly functioning brain. If you can get his attention."

"And you?" Mitsui was determined to unearth the bottom of their unusual connection: the reticent star player and this Akiyama Kasumi, as mysterious as her shifting, transient namesake. "How do you know so much about the West? Your English is good, too."

"So… you want to work at the shop," Kasumi mused. She seemed to have forgotten his question. "I want to let you know that Mother returned to her hometown, and carved out this livelihood all by herself."

Mitsui watched her irises jump around like splattering raindrops, lost in memory.

"I was eleven when I was plunged into this strange, strange fishbowl of a place. I knew that she continued to be ostracized here as she had been in the States. There, she was made fun of for not knowing how to speak English exactly like everyone else. They thought that she was dumber for it. Here, her little _hafu_ child, who used to have blonde hair and amber eyes, was bullied, and that broke Mother's heart because she knew it was a battle that it did not deserve to fight. The memory of Mother crying over the tax books on that scruffy settee, was the same memory of the woman crying as she took off her child's shoes at the doorway of the house.

"What I wanted to convey, I guess, Mitsui-san, is that we are the same. When we confront our past, no matter how painful, we do not return to the weaker selves we have once been."

Mitsui felt a chill; Anzai _sensei_ had said, just this afternoon, that returning to basketball had made him far more valuable than that MVP in middle school.

"I looked at the two cultures that I hated with my whole heart, and I decided to embrace them. Now, you have also found the reward in this wisdom. How did it feel to shoot that last three-pointer against Sannoh?"

Mitsui had no words; he only lifted a hand over his heart. To speak was to justify, and to justify was to undermine the infinity in the trajectory of that ball; the motion of it tumbling through the air, dropping nearer and nearer to the mouth of the basket. The cool waft of air against his empty palms. The tug at his spirit as he landed back on the ground and lowered his arms.

She read his eyes. Kasumi nodded, and tapped her own chest.

"That is what I feel when I can show Mother a clean report, with a clear conscience, and thank her for giving me an education. That's why my English is good. Fulfilment is a good feeling, yes?"

"I think now is a good feeling, too," Mitsui said.

Kasumi looked at him levelly.

"It is."

She grinned faintly as a murder of crows winged past the towers, spiraling down towards the darkened canal.


	11. Chapter 11

The weeks following, in which Mitsui cast himself into the responsibilities that he had so suddenly announced his claim over, were widely revelatory. Having thought himself rather capable of taking care of his own needs, and owning up to a history of detesting the kind ministrations of his parents, he now found that he was actually ill-suited to the variety of skills needed in the upkeep of the Akiyamas' independent businesses.

In the first week of the course of employment, the setbacks he caused led him to no end of embarrassment. Kasumi left him to write the multitude chalk signs small and large that so prettily adorned the flower displays, but his efforts were so clumsy and lacking in colour coordination as to render them unusable.

Laughing, she had told him to leave them, and installed him in the back shed to prepare a fresh batch of household herbs. Still, he managed to upset the order of soil material layered in the little orange pots, and they spent the rest of that day separating shale and pebbles from loam and fertilizer, Mitsui occupied by a fugue of repentance for and capitulation against his incompetence; while Kasumi, nor her mother when she looked in for a minute, seemed to be fazed by the setback.

Another experience that caused Mitsui to question his constitution was caused by Kasumi's abandoning him to a group of middle-aged customers in the shop. Fluttering about Mitsui, the ladies patted tinted perms and talked about their sons who were disloyal and had never helped out at home, and how they wished that they had children that wouldn't play pachinko nor hang out like delinquents every day.

One of them was glad, she confessed conspiratorially to him, that the young Akiyama had a friend like him to safeguard her now that she had seemed to reform herself; Kasumi had been rather wayward, as she herself had been a beauty back in the day.

Another took the opportunity to squeeze his bicep, and thanked him and his manly sensibilities for choosing an arrangement that would suit her husband's altar for their anniversary; although, to Mitsui's consternation, he had not given any indication that he was remotely inclined to assert any opinion over such a matter.

The cloying pall of perfume that they left in the store did not diminish Kasumi's smile as she emerged again from the back of the store.

"What a delightful group of aunties. And your first sale!"

Mitsui slapped the bills from the transaction next to the cash register.

"You left me on purpose," he growled.

"I would never," Kasumi answered innocently, showing him the pre-made bouquet that was meant for the deceased husband.

"No one spends fifteen minutes doing that!"

"What do you know," Kasumi retorted with a toss of her head. "And, anyway, you've been _such_ a dandy to old Mrs. Akito, yes?"

The image of the lady's red claws and tattooed eyebrows haunted him more than he cared to admit, and produced an aversion so deep that, much to the confusion of his parents, he protested most vehemently when his own mother returned home one day with her own, arguably mild, cosmetic enhancement. The vanity of the fading and middle-aged must be accommodated, however, and it can be safely said that the one who capitulated was not the person who benefited from the arrangement, nor the one who paid for it.

Eventually, Kasumi put him to better use out-of-doors. The sight of Mitsui, hammering characters into the new wooden sign above the shop, the ridges of his broad back visible through his shirt, encouraged a greater than usual amount of foot traffic.

As he cleaned around the surrounding wall and took a roller to the fresh concrete, a tide of upturned faces passed the threshold and asked Akiyama-san about her prices, and how about that _fantastic_ job by the new worker in the paint-stained pants?

The serving girl, who had not forgotten the inestimably cool group of high school students whom she had served, invited her friends over on Pancake Day, and blushed all over as they pestered her about the boy cleaning the picket fence around her uncle's café.

She almost spilled the tea as he looked up distractedly from clearing some tough creepers from the point at which wooden slat met brick wall.

"What's this?"

Mitsui wiped his face in a rough dash that smudged grime from his gloves on his chin, by that striking line of his scar. She noticed that he had eyes of flashing black opal.

"Um, I thought… you must be thirsty from all your hard work. Please accept this drink."

She dared not look up from the ground, belatedly mortified by her forwardness.

Mitsui was perfectly civil in his response; he pulled off a glove and took the cup, blowing on the hot liquid, before downing it as fast as was humanly possible. Through this ritual, the girl felt the stares of her friends stabbing into her from a distant table, though she dared not look back to meet their probing.

"Thank you." Mitsui was vaguely irritated by her hangdog countenance, and was already chipping at a knot of stems with a trowel, trying to rid himself of the liquid look in her eyes.

The girl caught a glance of his frown, tore her eyes away, and felt a sharp arrow pierce her breast as she turned to leave. Even as she intuited that Mitsui was unhappy, such was her deep and narrow infatuation that she blamed herself for intruding upon him, rather than any other circumstances in the situation. The drag in her step must have been substantial enough that Mitsui interrupted her departure.

"Hey," he said, his eyes reading something close to remorse, "what is your name?"

"Suzuki," the girl blurted, mortified.

"Thank you, Suzuki-san. My name is Mitsui Hisashi. Please take care of me."

Her heart fluttered as Mitsui unknowingly called her by her first name. As for the second fact, though she already knew it, Suzuki would never wish him to unspeak any of his pearls of wisdom.

* * *

What about things on the basketball court, how did things move on in that gym? Kasumi, for one, was not left alone, once Miyagi related their backyard misadventure to his friends before Ayako could caution him with discretion. Akagi only asked Mitsui shortly if he had been hurt in the mishap, and given a glance at Kasumi when she turned up punctually for her cleaning duties, while a freshman, Kuwata, called over, "Akiyama-san, does your pet crow give tuition for English? Please help me ask how it accepts payment." It was an attempt at a ribbing, but Kasumi joined the repartee gamely.

"I would rather be worrying about the wisdom of your proposal, Kuwata-san. If you could address a starting fee to the name of Akiyama, however, I will see to it that the money gets to him."

She never made an attempt to include herself in the club's interactions, however, unless first called upon. Mitsui was aware that many of them were curious about the circumstances of her detention, her missing digits, and her reservedness; while not withholding the fact that he worked for her family almost all days of the week, he did not avail himself to their curiosity. The fact was, he did not know these answers himself, and was content to keep his peace and distance.

Mitsui himself played, not harder, but with a great deal more untroubled looseness than he had in a long time. The Inter Highs had been taxing on his endurance, and the return to the normal routine of training had him raring to prove his skill; now, however, his body had equilibrated itself, and the much-needed encouragement from Coach had stoked his robust player's spirit.

Kasumi's needle-sharp perception had also cast his mind back to his roots, and brought about a fresh reminder of how no tide was impossible to turn. Shohoku might be ranked C, and he might have denounced all ties with basketball, but this was his road to redemption.

His concentration during the sessions were unwavering, earning even an offhand remark from Miyagi. 'The Invitational' was, unknown to Mitsui, gradually forming a mantra for him and his team members, and they bided their time in persistent and amplifying application of skill.


	12. Chapter 12

Kasumi failed to appear at the last training of summer break. It felt like a gap in the teeth. The session felt like a momentous mark in the year of Shohoku's ascent; school would start the following week in a new semester. Although the seniors had already passed out for entrance exams, Miyagi appointed as new captain, and the new team's drive engaged in the fresh competitive season, where nothing was assured nor given… the fact that some spirit of that original unseeded, underdog team still existed within the bubble of this lull, filled with a desperate non-doing within the remnants of the summer break, was finally about to pass away – it made Mitsui long for the moments he had yet to complete living out.

As far as he was not given to rumination, the thought of academics, although he was far from incapable, clouded the clarity of freedom. No longer would the school be quietly empty at 5a.m., or stand noiseless until the birdsong pierced the cavern of their gym with the first filaments of sunrise. No longer could pure joy of the sport take the unchallenged forefront in his days; thoughts of college acceptance, sports scholarships, and the impending, unknown era of his life, too, would jostle for attention. No longer was life going to be so simple as the turn of the days by the waning and waxing of his body's vitality.

The work that had allowed Mitsui to accrue a little allowance, too, had ended by way of an unassuming dinner with the Akiyamas. Four of them sat around a low square table in the living room above the florist's; Akiyama-san scooped rice from the cooker beside her, Kasumi's elder brother still wore his policeman's uniform, while Kasumi and Mitsui had grass stains and burrs on their trousers.

The son was different from Kasumi; he had eyes ever ready to crinkle into crescents, and an earnest, almost submissive – but never vulnerable – manner of behaviour. He talked a little bit about working for the civil service, as well as being an assistant sword skills instructor at the police academy, offering Mitsui the first pick of the _komochi shishamo_. The little grilled fish were served alongside a refreshing, sour _sunomono_ and silken tofu sprinkled with minced pork and sliced spring onion.

Kasumi opened beers for her brother and Mitsui, while she and her mother drank tea. The elders did not react whatsoever as Mitsui took a tentative sip of the chilled alcohol, and Kasumi only tilted her glass in a sly _kanpai_ , one eye twitching.

The rest of that evening was spent by the muted drone of the television and games of bridge, interrupted only when Kasumi brought out a tray of chocolate éclairs as dessert. The glow from another bottle of alcohol stayed with Mitsui long into that night, carrying him home, and slipping him into a deep and unbroken slumber.

"Ayako-san," Mitsui asked now, as he toweled his face dry of perspiration, "has Akiyama-san been let off detention?"

The manager had been writing industriously in her clipboard, preparing full reports on the various skills and levels of dedication of each of the players, based on her observations and informal interviews; now, her attention sharpened on the issue at hand.

"Not to my knowledge. I have asked Kuwata-san and Iishi-san to resume cleaning duty today, but Kasumi was supposed to be here as per normal."

Mitsui watched the freshmen stumble in with the household implements, and set upon the court with alacrity despite their tiring exercise; they, by their diligence, were seeking favour under the watchful eyes of the seniors so as to earn themselves a place as starter in the coming competitive season. Rukawa swigged from a bottle of iced water, while Miyagi barked about a section of the floor that had been overlooked.

"Can you tell me why Akiyama was punished in the first place?" Mitsui asked.

He turned his gaze back to the manager. The reader need not doubt that he had extended this query to its principal, who had waltzed his attention away from it with another one of her impish segues.

"'Why'?" Ayako repeated.

She clicked her pen a few times, and finally clipped it to her papers. She knew about the circumstances of the arrangement, having been entrusted to supervise the detention by the person-in-charge, but had not seen the need to explain on Kasumi's behalf; Ayako had not come into a position of responsibility by a runaway mouth. The girl herself had seemed unconcerned as to what others cared to think. Perhaps, because – or despite – of this fact, something resembling concern must have fueled the sudden twinge of truth that Ayako let take its course.

"I don't think I can tell you why, only how she put herself in detention." She looked pointedly at Mitsui. "Kasumi punched the student council president."


	13. Chapter 13

Would things change with the new term? This was what Kasumi wondered as she tightened her shoelaces and looked at the backboard silhouetted in the early morning sky. She guessed that she had a good half hour before having to report for detention. The dribbling of the ball seemed sacrilegious, shattering the gradual awakening of the neighbourhood, but it felt like a liberating trespass. It took a while for her limbs to warm up, chasing away the chill that the walk to the public basketball court had not managed to do.

Kasumi flexed her wrists and fingers, feeling the joints pop. As the ball jostled against her palms, she fancied that all her digits were restored. It was the ghostly syndrome, as she called it, where she would forget about her amputation, and return to ways she used to do things that were, in reality, no longer feasible: like using her outer fingers to squeeze the brakes on a bike, or using chopsticks, or, even, handling a ball.

She let out a sardonic grin. Whoever heard of a half-handed player? Impaired she was, undoubtedly; as to being a player… _that_ she was trying to reclaim.

As Kasumi eased into the practice that her body used to know instinctively, her mind reflected upon the things that had borne her to that moment. Cleaning the gym had been less of a punishment than the President could have hoped; instead, it had been a month or so of productivity. Her detention had provided an impetus to rise before the sun: prepare a wholesome breakfast for Mother and herself – sometimes running to the neighbour's for a canister of fresh milk, complete household chores, and feed Blagden and the cats, before she had to leave for school. The crow hadn't been in his usual roost just under the roof of the shed this morning, but Kasumi was used to his comings and goings, and set the plate of vegetable offcuts and some fish on a ledge high off the ground.

She had finally figured out how to secure the shed's key, and it involved a sea of patience and dog treats. Rather than searching for the most obscure and inconvenient hiding spot, Kasumi had begun to train Blagden with keen avidity.

Much more than sparkly objects, what he enjoyed was human attention. The games that Kasumi devised occupied his intellect a good deal, and he forsook the hiding game for whichever puzzling contrivance she left out for him. If he behaved wilfully, she emphasised her displeasure with a turn of her shoulder, a repetitive, cutting remark, and the withdrawal of these daily occupations, such that Blagden came to understand to leave her belongings be.

This scheme she would readily attribute to Mitsui. Once, upon weeding the ornamental shrubs in the garden, Mitsui had suddenly struck a palm against the gray stones, an expression of pleased revelation appearing on his face.

Kasumi, crouched a few lengths away from him, looked up from her work. "I'm afraid that was far from a Dragon Fist, Mitsui-san. There are as many weeds living on your side as there were before."

She was justified in saying this; for every bundle she pulled, Mitsui had only a handful that were broken off without the roots, and he occasionally attacked some of the more delicate cosmos plants that edged the plot. Although he tried to conceal the damage, the broken stems that drooped with the last of summer's pink flowers were obvious.

"No, I just might have a way to deal with that bird." Mitsui was too excited to be rankled at Kasumi's comment, as he started to gather a good weight of pebbles at speed. He stood and peered about until he espied Blagden perched upon the weather vane of the laundry shop. "Great. Do you have a thin container? Something the crow can't reach into."

Presently, they assembled on a flat part of the shed's roof; there, Blagden could take wing if the cats should decide to take interest, and the location piqued his curiosity.

"We need to pretend we don't care," Mitsui said wisely as he put away the ladder, and they returned to their original task.

After several inquisitive swivels of his head, Blagden deigned to swoop down by where he had seen the humans deposit a curious assortment of objects. Just as the fable prophesied, the intelligence of the crow rewarded it; Blagden plunged rock after rock into the narrow-necked vase, then gorged on the pungent dried squid that rose with the surface of the water within.

"Hah, now be off!"

The crow absconded with a throaty squall as Mitsui ran towards the shed with a thunderous expression and flailing arms.

"See, Akiyama-san." He seized the thin gold chain abandoned on the sun-warm roof. "That Blagden will never get the better of I. Stolen by an ungrateful crow? _Cheh!_ "

Kasumi smiled as she received the choker from his grasp.

"Indeed, your childhood education is consummated. I must thank your mother for those _tiresome_ nights of reading you bedtime stories."

"You underestimate me, Akiyama-san…"

At that point, he was as yet unused to her fondness of gibes, and the muttered reply evinced his punctured enthusiasm.

To be fair, each had changed the other with the progress of their companionship. While Mitsui was in the beginning only straightforward, and graceless in wit, he learned to dance along with her verbal sparring, and enjoyed learning about the many cultural references and foreign phrases that peppered her speech.

Kasumi herself looked forward to the times that brought him to the shop; she made it a game anticipating how he would react to a certain task; at times disappointed by her inaccuracy, while, at others, pleased by the spark that leapt in his eyes when he got to work the wood for a new flower stand; that quick arch of an eyebrow, or a lopsided smile, with the overfamiliar approach of a customer, invariably female; the seeming discrepancy between his delicate handling of the six mewling kittens after one of the cats gave birth, and the detriment of his large hands when it came to gardening.

These discoveries she bore with gladness, and remembered as part of the larger scroll of her life in which few friends were featured. She was, by constitution, comfortable with solitude. Besides, the country had treated this child with much disfavour in her earlier years; therefore, this nurtured a new dimension of life that she treasured all the more for its novelty, and the unhindered ease at which it continued to develop. If she could find that connection, however, as she had done between inheritance and fulfillment, God only knows what depths this story could delve into.

Kasumi was so consumed by this inward meditation, that she quite failed to perceive the quickening lightness of day, nor hear the purr of hefty motors past the outer perimeter of the wire-fenced compound. She was occupied in body as well: adjusting the minute movements of her hands according to her handicap, measuring the strength needed in the shot, altering the angle of the downward snap of her wrists as the ball flew from her grip.

It was only by the preternatural silence, at the cut of the engines, that brought her awareness back to the moment, and the ring of encroaching footsteps.


	14. Chapter 14

"We're sorry to bother you, Akiyama-san."

Mitsui bowed as Kasumi's mother looked out at the group of them. The sign on the door notified the customers of a lunch break until 2p.m.

The lady tightened the scarf around her neck and smiled with perfect hospitality.

"Mit-chan, it is no bother in the least. How can I help you all?"

The resemblance between her and Kasumi was clear: they shared the same lithe frame and delicate hands; Kasumi's intensity of vigour distinguished itself from her mother's mellow grace, however.

"Is Kasumi-san home? We were wondering if you knew of her whereabouts," Mitsui said, after a short hesitation.

Akiyama-san frowned, but not with undue concern. "She said this morning that she went out to play basketball. Hmm, I thought she meant with you all."

Mitsui exchanged a look with Ayako. The others remained silent, waiting for either of them to direct their next move. The question floated among them like a trembling bubble: Kasumi… play basketball? That detention student who fastidiously mops the floors during trainings?

Before Mitsui could excuse them, Akiyama-san said, "I should provide you with refreshments for the trouble of travelling all the way here to look for Kasumi." She glanced at the skies outside. "The weather is turning. Please do wait inside, I am sure she will be around any time now."

Ayako was horrified by their intrusion, and Haruko likewise disinclined, but the steel in the lady, amply supplied by a deep-rooted maternal instinct, saw the party being ushered beyond the public area and up the stairs to the living quarters. Unlike what social etiquette dictated, that the home was too humble to befit the honoured eyes of guests, Akiyama-san was greatly excited at hosting friends of Kasumi, the prospect of which she had never dared imagine would come true, such that her usual contriteness concerning the state of the domestic space was overcome; it was just as well that the laundry had been folded, and the shelves dusted just today. The number of those present, crowding the vestibule, was merely a testament of their attachment to Kasumi, was it not?

She unearthed a bundle of indoor slippers, and shook her head with wonder at how they were not big enough for the boys' feet.

 _Japanese teenagers these days – so diverse_ , she thought, simultaneously cautioning the dark-skinned captain against head-butting the slightly lowered ceiling.

Akagi himself was questioning if his presence was necessary; he did not know this small woman's daughter, and had only been drawn in by Ayako's startling revelation. His basketball itch refused to lie obediently dormant for the greater good of his academic career, and he had broken secretly away from his study schedule to check in on the newly pioneered team. Sensitive to every nuance of the fledgling that he still considered his, Akagi had decided to prolong this short break away from his books.

"Sorry for the intrusion," he murmured, and received a kind pat on the hand from Akiyama-san. The group trickled over the _genkan_.

"Ah, yes, that is Kasumi's room. I did not show you around the last time you came."

Mitsui quickly turned away from the doorway he had been trying to peer through, but the lady spread open the leaf of that door to reveal the bare-bones quarters.

It was as sparse a habitation as those who knew her would expect. Shelves reaching to the ceiling occupied a good one and a half walls within, while a single bed and miniature _kotatsu_ occupied the rest of the space. Her school uniform hung from a ledge of one of the bookcases, drawing the eye to what seemed like volumes of English novels and hard, plastic cases. More of the same array were stacked under the bed.

Rukawa knew the collection of resources to be found there which, if he were one to postulate, could very well be the most comprehensive pool of English literature to be found within the entire city. Public libraries had yet to diversify. Kasumi, in the course of their scholastic alliance, had encouraged him to take home the CDs of those western rock bands, and cassettes of recorded basketball games, insisting that the rapid-fire commentary would, if not understood, be unconsciously imbibed by his left brain. He did not ask her why she possessed this trove, merely nodding when she promised the more advanced books to his disposal, and now regularly listened to the foreign music and other learning resources he had procured on his own.

The territory of the living room was tangibly more neutral. Outside, it began to rain heavily in a thunderous clap. Mitsui touched his fingertips gratefully to his cup of hot tea, and watched as the rest of his teammates arranged themselves on the floor cushions with some inexplicable, shared penitence.

As luck would have it, however, or by some nurtured maturity, Mrs. Akiyama was not unable to handle the social situation that she had created; she sped through small talk that Ayako, Haruko, Rukawa, Miyagi, Akagi, and Mitsui could answer, and answer they did, with a wondering alacrity around how they would extract themselves from the situation with tolerable grace, and couldn't Kasumi come quickly? The rain lightened up almost immediately, and soon the drumming against the windowpanes faded away.

A rustling interrupted them from the corridor. Blagden bobbed into view with half-open wings, to the amazement of all.

"The crow!" Miyagi exclaimed.

"If you could open the window, Ru-chan," Akiyama-san said with a tiny, resigned shake of her head, "Kasumi is especially partial to Blagden, and lets him roost in her room even with my express disapproval."

 _Stranger and stranger_ , Akagi thought. He shifted his great frame, and Rukawa stepped back to let the crow scrabble onto the windowsill, then drop out of view.

"We had many pets while living in America, so perhaps it was inevitable that she somehow adopted one stray or another," Akiyama-san explained, "But _karasu!_ Some say they're bad luck."

"Where did you stay in America?" Haruko asked.

"Michigan state, Haruko-chan. Kasumi's father was a sailor."

"Eh?" Haruko was genuinely excited. "Do you have any photos of Michigan, Akiyama-san?"

The woman was pleased by the unadulterated enthusiasm of Kasumi's girl friend, and was prompted to produce several immaculate tomes.

The albums were packed with photos snapped freely, some even bearing the blurriness and splotches of unsteady, young hands behind the shutter or in the darkroom. Here was the lakeside house with frolicking dogs; there a laughing baby with dirty blonde ringlets in the prow of a teal motorboat, her diaper glowing white in the sunlight and knee-deep in small fish; then a striped lighthouse and wind-whisked waterscape behind Akiyama-san and Kasumi's brother, still a rosy-cheeked boy, the composition almost lopping off the forehead of a tall man – their father.

These pictures containing the mysterious gentleman the young people were hesitant to dwell upon, but Akiyama-san showed no discomfort as she continued to weave a tableau: about Thanksgiving dinner, and how she botched her first turkey by replacing salt with sugar in the brine; about the multifarious activities that the luxury of space – wide, open space – could enrich a childhood: the siblings battling each other with switches felled from nearby copses, Kasumi refusing a bath for two weeks straight because she insisted that swimming in the lake each day was enough, 'coon-spotting on those darkened winter evenings, and the brother getting bitten on the seat of his pants when his rear appeared like a darkling moon over the entrance of a mother's nest.

These accounts, though but trivial remembrances, were tinged by a nostalgic sweetness, and Haruko's gentle concerns were thus sated by the wide and largely unknown facts of life overseas. Even the others were not bored, and bore the growing diorama with candid interest.

Mitsui came away with a new appreciation of the amiable woman who prospered her businesses through such easygoing charm; she talked only to keep her guests entertained, and was otherwise disposed to listen just as well as she told stories, which made her the most unassuming host. He was almost disappointed when the journey brought them to the last of the photographs.

"Does Akiyama-san wish to go back to Michigan?" Ayako queried.

The woman shook her head.

"Maybe in the future… but not anytime soon, Ayako-san. Why, do you plan to travel? I know Ru-chan does," she commented.

Mitsui was perturbed by the moniker, for Rukawa was the last person to be considered adorable. If he had it in him to give but a smile, no doubt maidens, not least Haruko, would weep to the tune of Cupid's twanging bowstring; such was the uncultivated potential of that regally handsome and delicate face.

As it was, the guarded freshman remained as expressive as stone. He was passing one heavy album back to its owner, when a back cover flapped open, and a few errant slips skimmed across the tabletop and fell near Mitsui's arm.

 _And the story continues…_ Mitsui thought. The tiniest smile of anticipation danced on his lips as he picked them up and flipped them over.

The images were unclear to his mind at first, but then shock loomed over him like a cresting wave, crushing the air from his chest. Stillness seemed to smother the space of the room suddenly.

"Oh…" Akiyama-san made a horrible sound in her throat.

"Mitsui," Akagi said. "Put them back."

But his hands were frozen, his eyes unable to roll any other way in their sockets. He continued to stare at the terrible pictures: of a hand tied at the wrist with a tourniquet, that green surgical cloth splashed over with streaks of brown, cartilaginous matter protruding from the ring and last fingers – pink-stained, ragged–

A hand obstructed Mitsui's view, and Rukawa firmly removed the photographs from his grasp.

* * *

This wasn't the way, Mitsui thought, dazed – to bury hurt with ignorance.

"What happened?" He lifted his eyes to Akiyama-san.

"Mitsui!" Ayako said sharply.

His brow furrowed. "Kasumi keeps her secrets close. She–she guards her heart too well," he said. "Please, Akiyama-san. Will –please tell me what happened to her. Let truth speak." He did not care what was right or wrong, appropriate or _faux pas_ ; an overriding, pinpoint pressure conjured the pleas of his mouth.

Kasumi's mother, with remarkable lucidity, considered the youth leaning earnestly towards her. He was a dear, dear child, and his unacknowledged attachment to Kasumi provoked a niggle of envy with its white naiveté. Long had she come across someone who had gone through as much as Kasumi had related about his tumultuous coming-of-age, and still able to remain as unscathed and precious as the time when his mother's laugh seemed be the entirety of his world, or an injured knee seemed to spell the end of it.

The broken wholeness with which he beheld and reacted to the world moved her deeply, and she wished her daughter, too, could see these things, of which Akiyama-san herself was incapable of speaking.

The beleaguered lady selected a thick letter from the pile that was never meant to see the light, and handed it to Mitsui.

" _O-ojama shimasu_." Akiyama-san thought her reaction would likely be perceived as an odious entreatment for pity, and an inexcusably immodest display of her emotional burdens, and she was not inclined to be wrong. Bowing deeply from the waist, she fled the room, unable to hold back her tears any longer.

As much as Akiyama-san did not lie to deceive those who asked after Kasumi, she had diverted and deflected their solicitudes all too readily, fearing the idea of losing face. God strike her if she were _ashamed_ of Kasumi, but… Was she not an upstanding member of society? An independent woman who had complete control over her life, emotions, family? A feeling of great remorse overtook her. What did these things matter? The mother realised that she had just as well forsaken her daughter, and left her to choose how to deal with her legacy all alone.


	15. Chapter 15

_Mama,_

 _You know how I jumble things up when I try to explain, so I turn to paper instead._

 _You asked me why I didn't greet Seniichi Uo on the street yesterday. I know he is the president of the student council, but I hate him. I know Dad used to work for Seniichi-san, and I wish I had a better heart, but I cannot bring myself to undo the grudges his past actions have nurtured. The ex-colleagues at the shipping company's U.S. quarters keep Seniichi up-to-date with the little minutiae of Dad's life: what he drank at the pub with his old friends last week, how his land is looking the worse for wear, who spends the night as his lodge – what_ they _drive, eat, wear, say… and all this he uses to sow rumours with great passion. He does nothing to hide the fact from me, and everyone does nothing to discredit him because he is the shipping magnate's son, the middle school top-scorer, and was junior-going-on-President._

 _I wouldn't be so hateful if they were true, for we know that Dad lives his own life, but I want to say that, in everything, he is not the one to be blamed. Remember: none of this is Dad's fault. Seniichi, out of some perverse pleasure, has been set on this life's work since middle school, bent on painting the name of Akiyama into the black books. There's no reason for it. I've stopped looking long ago._

 _So there's that: I can't stand him. I think you're shocked now, but take my word for this. Children don't stay angels._

 _The other thing is: I lied. There was no dog that bit me. Ah… hypocrisy. Please read on, Mama, don't stop reading._ _We need to face up to these things, together._

 _Do you remember how we always 'put to sea' at least twice a day? Dad's instruction from those countless hours were not in vain. When I was in Michigan this past winter, I could recall perfectly how to operate the motorboat: check the store and safety, navigate with two eyes on the horizon and a third on the motor just as he used to before the stroke._

 _He was in one of his moods that day: bad-tempered, jabbering, and positively out of his mind about going on the water. He smashed several of the pots on the porch as he waited for me to prep the vessel, or maybe it was the wind, which was blowing erratic but strong._

 _We cruised as if borne by air out along the shoreline. The only light was a white band just above the horizon, and the rest of the sky was gunmetal. Dad said it was the best time to fish, and he took two rods with him. One of them had the gold reel as big as my face, so I knew we were only heading back to shore if he got big game._

 _If you could have seen Dad, I think your heart would go soft for him. He is a Samson without his Delilah, his hair not gold anymore, but grey and thin. His arms are liver-spotted, and his fondness of beer has made him stout. Yet, he cuts a proud figure. He is as imperious as he ever was in directing exactly where the boat was to stop, and the rocking did not upset his balance in the least. He is uncouth, tattooed, crusty – a true sailor. Not even the thunderheads made him flinch, and he toasted the lightning that brought an ozone fizz to the air._

 _It started to rain when he cinched the catch. The line ran like you've never seen, and he laughed to the winds and wedged his feet into the deck to battle the fish. It was so fierce that the boat began to drift along. To begin with, I only watched Dad jigging the rod up and down, tiring the pike, but soon his arms began to tremble. His muscles have withered from being cooped up indoors too much, and it irked him to recognise that, I think. He ground his teeth, a terrible sound that I could hear above the rain rapping onto wood. He shouted something at me, but I couldn't hear._

 _Then the hull shuddered along a submerged bank, throwing us against the prow. I panicked, and fired the motor. Dad scrambled back to his feet, trying to tell me something, but I couldn't hear. The fish streaked towards shore as the boat leapt away from it, and I thought he was going to go overboard. He keeled starboard, and I instinctively shot out my hand to help him, though he didn't need it and I think he screamed at me to stop, or steer, or something. My hand got entangled in the line._

 _Dad hadn't realised what had happened in that split second. It was too fast. I didn't have time to shout. The line snapped taut, the tension dipping the tip of the rod to the water, whizzing the spool of the reel. I think it got snarled in the outboard motor, and the 17lb. line took weight before it finally snapped. Needless to say, it also took some of me_ _._

 _So, it wasn't a dog. It was a fish. I don't know if I should be disappointed that there's no glory to be found here in any case._

 _I don't mean to make light of the matter. You had your fit when you heard that I had been hospitalized, and I know you haven't forgiven yourself for not being there to help me, for leaving me all alone. But, remember, it was I who begged you, pleaded with you, to let me go back and visit, and I took it upon myself to refuse anything other than your agreement._

 _Besides, I_ wasn't _alone. Dad sobered up enough when we reached land, and he drove like Petty to the hospital. I could tell in the way that he strapped his belt around my wrist, mumbling empty consolations; in the way bundled me into the passenger seat and turned the heaters all the way up; in the way he kept looking at me as if I was going to disappear right in front of his nose, and shouting at me to count how many fingers he put up – he was more afraid than I was. We may have schisms between us, both literal and otherwise, but, in that little while, I loved him like that curly-haired kid who worshipped her_ dada _._

 _Ah, this letter is already too long. I hope you haven't started preparing dinner because I am now out searching for that bald old man who sells_ karinto _and_ yaki imo _. I remember you remarked that his had a particular flavour which reminded you of your village upbringing, but he never did drive back down our street._

 _I hope it will lighten both our moods, and is but a small offering. When you sent me to America on your money, I took your trust with me, but I never gave it back. Please forgive me._

 _I remain–_

 _Your and Dad's daughter._


	16. Chapter 16

Her bones felt like glass. The pain was the worst she had experienced in a long time. Kasumi considered her hand, twisting and turning the glistening appendage in the light. In fact, her skin glistened with a thousand of those tiny raindrops that slid off as she picked herself up off the floor. The scars had burst open again. It was a nuisance, really; she had run out of that surgical glue that the doctor had given her for her subcutaneous stitches, and cost more per ounce than that lipstick Mother insisted on buying for her birthday.

Kasumi felt bile rise as she swayed to her feet, and she clawed at the chain-link fence as she heaved up nothing, her head pitching to an imaginary swell. She spat several times to clear her mouth, watching the rosy mix of phlegm and saliva mingle with a puddle by her foot. She took several moments to assess her body, and determined it passably functional.

Kasumi glanced about the court, but her basketball had disappeared. She felt a pang. It had been a Spalding from the States, from Dad. Well, it made perfect sense; she recalled offhandedly that they had given her no quarter. In fact, the rubber sphere had been burst in a final, vehement stab, and its deflated shell trampled under the departure of the dark convocation.

The stares of commuters Kasumi endured with the same philosophical air as she had the beating. She worried more that someone would call an ambulance upon her, rather than whichever judgments they would care to form. She shambled along almost comically, unable to swing her arms as the rub of fabric against the burns and contusions on their undersides were excruciating.

As soon as she could, she lost herself in the labyrinth of the older neighbourhood, although one of her ankles throbbed with a vile complaint. The elements along the journey seemed to emphasise the dreariness of her condition: the sun refused to filter through the clouds, a passing car drenched her legs in a spray of murky silt, and an unseen cat yowled repeatedly as she passed an intersection.

Truth be told, their sophisticated cruelty surprised her. The most debilitating bruises were hidden beneath her clothes. She would attribute this refinement not to the balefully watching king, or his jester, or the entire band who she had the opportunity outwit at the beginning; rather, credit was due to the cruel, long-haired automaton named Steel.

"Where is he?" he repeated dispassionately.

With every incompliant shake of her head, he had delivered an uppercut to her ribs, chest, or sternum, until the leader had grown pale, and told him to stop, for God's sake she's not going to talk. Ungrateful brats like Mitsui he had no problem torturing, but this was the first time he had deployed the premium of his force against a girl who, although meddling and inconveniently unforthcoming, was nonetheless something of a fallen, shattered star. He observed dumbly the careless injuries that his gang had inflicted on her in their initial struggle – that split lip he had given her himself in an uninhibited fury, after she had smashed his nose with a neat punch.

"I keep my promises," she snarled at him, blood misting his face, "you will not lay your hands on Mitsui."

The last time Kasumi had punched someone was, in fact, the student council president. A terrible grin graced her face as she mounted the steps of a rickety external stairway. She had to pause in her ascent as shards of agony pierced her side. She leaned against the corroding banister, although it left streaks of rust on her shirt. Not that her garments were the most pristine at this time, you must understand. The reader can probably imagine the condition of a shirt given to line a dog's kennel, rumpled and tracked on, and it would have been a graceful image compared to what the assault had done to that innocent article of clothing.

As she tried to recover her composure, Kasumi noted with surprise the lump sitting in her throat. No… it was not repentance that she felt, but there was a recognition for the karma in the violence she had dealt Seniichi a number of weeks ago.

She had taken pains to avoid him upon entering high school. The student council room was a forbidden wing of the compound, and she never turned up for those monthly assemblies, where he would give a simpering, rallying address to the nods of the entire teaching body, knowing that she had nothing more than a sneer to offer; his two-facedness, painfully personal, reviled her. For all this, their inevitable confrontation had caught her unawares.

The school had been steeped in the purple of evening. Kasumi hovered outside the basketball club's room, a folder hugged to her chest. She listened closely for any activity, and was dismayed to hear none. Upon finding the gym empty, she had hurried here hoping to catch Rukawa before he left for home, for she had accidentally swept up his practice papers when she had had to rush off to remedial class after their study session earlier. She had no way of knowing that the entire basketball team had gone for a warm-down run around the vicinity.

Frowning, she made to leave, but stopped short as someone else appeared in the empty corridor.

"Skulking about the basketball club's room. Kasumi-chan, are you hoping to play?" Seniichi's glasses gleamed as he wasted no time in broaching the most important point. "I'm afraid they already have a redheaded fool this year. Akagi has no need for a mute _and_ half-handed imbecile, even if you could be more of a tomboy."

He had a regal confidence that was impossible to deny, making him an assertive, wilting bully. Those extraordinary oratorial skills he wielded with virtuous impunity; is it any wonder that Seniichi thought the majority of those around him during middle school had been brainless unfortunates? The teachers, too, but of course he treated them with respect to gain their favouritism.

"Oh," Seniichi continued, "have you seen Ayako-chan? I have a notice that will greatly displease her. Do you want to know what it is?"

"No."

The blithe President cleared his throat. He unfolded the missive and read: "'The entire starting line-up of the basketball team have failed four or more subjects.' _Tsk tsk_ , you're associating with a band of fools, Kasumi. When Kaede-kun flunks out of school, don't tell me I didn't warn you. Even a super rookie needs to know how to read his ABCs. By the way," he continued most affably, "your father has taken a new _bedfellow_. She's just like the other hussies–"

"Please stop."

"–Or we could talk about how the…" Kasumi tried to step past Seniichi.

"How rude," he interjected, pushing his glasses up his tall nose. "So it's true, I see, what the good American housewives say at their neighbourhood soirées. That Japanese woman never did raise her–"

 _Bam_.

Bullseye: calculated, calm, utterly intentioned. Ayako, who had been listening just out of sight, started in shock.

He hadn't even been expecting it, though, Kasumi thought; that was the worst part of the charade. Seniichi had built up an image of her as a deplorable, spineless Akiyama that better suited the years spent looking down on her family, and belittling her from afar. He had perpetuated this pet fantasy for so long that he believed whole-heartedly in it. The faith in his righteous judgment served to inflate his self-importance as a figure of leadership; the tragedy in the protraction of this mindless childhood cruelty of his went unnoticed.

Seniichi took the blow to the face without knowing the entirety of the frustration and simmering hurt that backed it. He smashed his head against the wall, with an expression of petulant surprise. The shards of his broken glasses tinkled to the floor.

Two days later, he wrote that ultimatum for her, congratulating himself for knowing Kasumi so well. He fingered his bandaged eye, savouring the thought of her full and complete torment.

 _Keep your enemies close_ , he thought, _and then place them closest to the thing they can never have again_.

 _Flies_ , Kasumi thought. Mosquitoes in her ears. She closed the back door behind her and tried to shake them off. But her mind remained restless, and the drone continued.


	17. Chapter 17

The sliding door struck the doorframe like a pistol shot. Everyone jolted, looking away from Mitsui to the corridor. For one heartbeat, then two, the group which had been held rapt by the letter looked at the letter-writer herself.

"K–K–" Haruko stuttered as they beheld Kasumi's state.

Mitsui felt his heart leap in his chest, then tighten painfully. The horizontal cut on her neck drew his gaze first; the blood that had sheeted down to her collar also matted her hair to her skin. As she raised her head, one or two black cigarette burns leapt out from under her chin. From the bow of her shoulders, he knew instinctively where she was hurting: aching ribs, battered lungs, rattled teeth.

Her eyes, which had been drifting, pillowed by haze, suddenly fastened upon his. Slowly they took in his naked features, the note he held, their solemn gathering. Someone gasped. The mist cleared.

"Kasumi!" The cry tore from Mitsui's lips. She slammed the door closed. The letter was forgotten. "Ka–" Mitsui rose in pursuit so quickly that he slipped and slammed one knee into the ground.

Akagi reached out a hand to steady him. Haruko, sitting by the doorway, pulled off her cardigan and pressed it into his hands as he jumped back up and ran past. Tears trembled in her eyes as she watched him blow out of the house. "Please…" A prayer trembled under her breath.

In the street, Mitsui stopped, casting his gaze around in desperation. "God damn it, where are you?" he said. The buildings seemed austere and friendless, and the overcast sky threw an ominous, shifting light that rendered the surroundings unfamiliar. He was in a parallel universe, tumbling through the uncanny valley. He started down the street, then trailed to a halt, biting his lip. A sound came from his right, and he saw Suzuki exit the café.

"Suzuki-san!" He vaulted over the fence and closed the distance between them in a blink. The girl had more grace than what the reader might assume. She had a good heart, and courteous goodwill that triumphed a lot of the more temporary things of value that the male sex are so drawn towards at first glance.

She looked upon the harried boy, thinking how handsome he was, really; the serious planes of his face attractively strong, the movement of his body giving him a capable and protective air, although he wasn't even college age yet. And the organ in her breast ached, because the stormy eyes that skittered over her were not meant to stay.

"Suzuki-san," Mitsui panted. "I–"

Suzuki interrupted him by nodding calmly, and pointed in the opposite direction. She already knew his heart, and it did not lie with her. Perhaps she had known from the start that it couldn't be more than the passion of her imagination, but some emotions stem from less rational places than the mind, and are impossible to treat or erase phlegmatically.

"Thank you," Mitsui said. He gripped her forearms for a moment, and was gone.

Suzuki closed her eyes as the trees seemed to sough a dirge, and the deserving girl cradled her wrists to her bosom, inside which her heart could not decide whether to mourn or rejoice. Sadly, we must leave the girl here alone on the step of her uncle's restaurant, with all our useless and unheard thanks to her for allowing the story to continue.

* * *

With that useful clue, Mitsui streaked towards the place which had earlier slipped from his mind. It was clear to him now where Kasumi would retreat to, and he was most fortunately right. He experienced a jab of debilitating uncertainty as his first survey revealed the platform to be dismal and windswept, but as he completed a canvass around the water tanks he came across a silent form slumped near one precipice. It had its head hung to its knees, and it sought only to breathe; in and out, in and out, the cadence of those huffs like the closing echoes of a concerto in this damp and dingy cavern beneath the clouds.

There was no reaction as Mitsui dropped down next to it. Their breathing synched for a moment, then ran their itinerant ways. He removed a handkerchief from one pocket, wet it under a nearby faucet, then returned to his crouch. Only the _drip, drop_ of water from the white square of fabric broke the silence. He waited.

"Please go away," Kasumi rasped.

A bruise leaked down the side of her thigh in technicolour hues. The scrapes on her knees broke apart and wept again as she angled herself away from him listlessly.

"No," Mitsui said.

"I want to be alone, please," Kasumi intoned. He didn't move. "Go away."

"You can choose not to be alone."

She knew that he had read her letter. Fuck, they all had.

"Do you think I want you, or anyone, to see me like this?" The guardedness in her voice slipped. "You already know everything you want to know. There's no need for you to stay."

"Are you done?" Mitsui slammed his fist into the tank. It answered with a muffled _clang_. "Are you done pushing me away? Are you done telling people you needed them only after you've suffered?"

His own fierce words echoed accusingly in his ears. It was only after they had left his mouth that Mitsui realised that was how he felt. He wasn't going to play broken telephone with any of his friends.

"Don't you realise that there's nothing more you can do to keep me here than force me to leave?"

He wanted to howl to the winds, curse what had taught this girl to think that folding and hiding into herself was okay, that to weather the storms one had to retreat deeper and deeper, until the only light she believed that she could depend on was her own frail conviction, absent of the support proffered by those who cared about her. That if she managed to be self-contained, she would cushion any hurt that she might bring to them. Kasumi couldn't bring herself to shake off that armour.

Was he doing this right? Mitsui wondered. Or was he actively estranging her with his outburst? Her silence unsettled him.

"Akiya… Kasumi?" Mitsui said.

"Remember you said I wasn't afraid of anything?"

Kasumi lolled her head to look at him.

Mitsui felt his stomach bottom out at the vacantness in her eyes. His anger had no effect upon her.

"You were wrong. You know nothing about me. Would that girl who faced the gang with you get beaten up like that? It's a lie. The Dragoness' granddaughter…" Her voice waned. "You can do nothing for me. So get lost."

Her eyelids drifted closed, and only the whisper of an exhale indicated wakefulness.

"Please."


	18. Chapter 18

"Please…"

The wind almost stole that last word from him. _Please_ –

The vastness of her struggle was belied in that small sigh, and Mitsui thought she was at once cutting the tie that they had built, and pleading for someone to save her from her own abyss.

Even if he were not the one bruised, and broken, her words drove a knife into a tender part of his chest. To so explicitly say that he was incapable of adding anything more to her life hurt him, and, obstinate as he could be, Mitsui refused to believe it. There had been enough talk, he thought. Let her bite if she wanted to.

Tenderly, he cupped her jaw and touched the wet cloth to her neck. Mitsui could feel every strand of hair thread through his fingers as he tilted her head and watched pink bloom on his pristine handkerchief. A brown stain dribbled down into her shirt from the wide cut, but Kasumi showed no sign of discomfort.

She did not stir as Mitsui cleaned the dried blood around her collar, combing her tresses over one shoulder as he had seen girls do. In the murky light, her skin seemed thin, like steamed rice paper.

He rinsed the handkerchief three more times, and each time he ministered to her face, arms, and legs with a touch as gentle as a lamb's nose. He took one of her wrists and lifted that hand onto its opposite collarbone, and used the handkerchief to tie it to her neck.

The scars smeared fresh red against her shoulder, but Mitsui felt more assured when they were elevated.

"Fingers are icy," he muttered to himself.

As Mitsui unfolded Haruko's sweater, tears began to leak from Kasumi's closed eyes. Her head, tipped against the water tank, fell forward. The clear liquid tracked down her cheeks, grooved along her swollen lip, dropping into her lap.

Silently, he reached out to arrange the garment around her, but Kasumi opened her eyes. Her expression transfixed him. Those wide eyes brimmed with something denser and deeper than tears.

"Mitsui-san." Her voice was the flutter of a fledgling sparrow, and her chin trembled. "I–I apologise from with all my heart. I'm sorry for being a burden to you. I'm sorry I can't…"

With the cardigan between them, Mitsui leaned forward and wrapped his arms around her, quelling her words. He laid his cheek against the crown of her head, holding her tightly.

"Kasumi, I know what you did for me," he murmured. "You stood by your conviction even when you had no responsibility, and it takes a dragon's heart to be able to… to sacrifice for a friend. I am indebted to you."

Mitsui paused. How would he account for those raised welts, scarring burns, and lingering injuries that adorned her body? Surely they did not make her less beautiful; but, if it were possible, he would bear all her pain in an instant. He did not feel worthy of her loyalty, that was certain; and yet she seemed not to understand the full value of her actions to him, considering it the only path she could have chosen in those circumstances.

Mitsui blinked rapidly. Kasumi remained unaware of how close he came to losing control of his emotions at that moment.

"I want you to know," he continued, swallowing hard, "that you need not be alone."

Kasumi could feel the rapid thrum of his heart against her arm, and even the movement of his throat reverberated by her temple. He smelled of lemons and wetness. His warmth was comforting, though she was loathe to admit it; she had never thought of asking anyone for a hug.

Kasumi fancied, for a moment, that she could understand why lovers enjoyed physical contact so much. Holding hands in public must feel like a well-kept secret between the two of the pair – a coal glowing at the point of contact, warming the fingertips even in the dead of winter. This felt like a drug, starting from a tingle running all over her scalp, and carrying her away on tides of calming bliss.

Before she could forget, Kasumi nodded into Mitsui's chest, momentarily resting her free hand on his bicep in acknowledgement. He drew back from the embrace, his countenance solemn.

"Thank you." Able to do so now, Kasumi clasped one of Mitsui's hands in hers. "It must have been a lot of trouble to tend to my wounds." She stopped as she noticed Mitsui looking curiously at her.

"No, not at all, but, um–" He raised a finger and brushed her cheek. "You won't stop leaking, Kasumi-san."

"Ah…" She swiped impatiently at her face, but, to Kasumi's consternation, the tears continued to flow. It was a most curious experience, unaccompanied by characteristic sniveling, just as if some optic channel were naturally and gracefully overflowing.

"If we could make this situation less uncomfortable, maybe you should overlook the recalcitrant attitude of my tear ducts, Mitsui-san." Kasumi smiled, then winced at the twinge in her lip.

To her surprise, Mitsui suddenly chortled.

"What?" Kasumi asked.

"Firstly, you're truly a special one. You're battered black and blue by a bunch of strange men, unable to stop crying, and you still find it within you to make a joke? Intolerable."

"Don't begrudge me my fun, Mitsui-san. This is a legitimate coping technique."

"Secondly," Mitsui said emphatically, "we just passed a touching milestone in our friendship, and you insist on calling me Mitsui-san. Why, Kasumi-san," he said knowingly, "you're terribly easy to read. At last you recognise me for the worthy bachelor that I am. My affectionate care has moved you so much, you continue to apply this alienating technique to guard your feelings. _Cheh_ , you can't hide anything from me."

He smirked into the distance, watching patches of rain shift over the distant landscape. The breeze riffled his hair, which sorely needed a trim around the ears.

"If I said you sound exactly like Sakuragi-san," said Kasumi, "would that deter you from spouting more ridiculous hypotheses?"

Mitsui pretended to give it a thought.

"Nope!" he said cheerfully.

Kasumi shook her head lightly. "Then I would suggest for you to concentrate developing your skills of 'affectionate care' much more than those of diagnosis. Come to think of it, doesn't the accusation say much more about the _accuser_ than the accused? What sinister intentions do you have, Mitsui-san?"

"If restoring you to good humour is dishonest: yes, I hereby plead guilty," Mitsui declared. His expansive grin was compelling.

"Whatever. I yield. Now," Kasumi said, reaching for him, "help me stand up, please."

As Mitsui gingerly drew her to a stand, she was struck by a deep sense of déjà vu; the weight of his palm, strong fingers curling around her own, that same tanned and veined forearm.

Kasumi glanced up at Mitsui to catch him doing exactly the same. They came to a swift, silent understanding, and a soft laugh escaped him.

"Another beautiful grand exit?" he alluded, before rushing to catch Kasumi around the waist as she was assaulted by dizziness and a profusion of other afflictions.

Mitsui held the weight off her bad leg while she regained her composure.

"Dragon's heart or otherwise, nothing so ambitious, please," Kasumi gasped.

"We need to airlift you off this damned platform," Mitsui said, eyeing her and the ground in turn, "and that'd be less ambitious than attempting the ladder."


	19. Chapter 19

Mitsui's breath sawed in and out of his chest in jagged bursts. The overhead lamps interfered with vision infuriatingly. Perspiration almost caused him to lose hold of the weight balanced on his shoulders. He reached for the deep reserves of his strength to yell a retort.

"Miyagi, are you trying to work us to death, you devil?"

His teammates, trapped in their own states of fatigue, grinned weakly as they continued to sprint to and from the court line, staggering under the weight of 10kg training bags.

"Keep quiet, Mitsui!" Miyagi executed a series of flawless double jumps with his skipping rope. "Two more laps for you."

Mitsui couldn't muster the breath to curse, and contented himself with mentally barraging the captain, and devising methods of using his skipping rope against him. Still, he understood the need for these intense conditioning exercises this close to the winter invitational, although this understanding did nothing to endear him to his burning muscles and exhausted psyche. Yes, he thought, lashes, and garroting, and–

" _Ganbatte, mina-san_ ," Haruko called.

"Switch!" Ayako tapped her stopwatch. "Perimeter line defensive screens and hoop."

The boys threw their equipment down, and scrambled to the half-court line in two ragged groups. The non-existent rest period only let them feel the full extent of their weariness.

"Alright, begin!"

The first pair proceeded. Rukawa smashed the ball from Iishi's hand almost languidly, taking sure possession with an evasive crossover and change of pace, before leaping into the air from the free throw line. The _wham_ of his slam dunk charged the entire gym and hummed through Mitsui's brain.

Everyone was transfixed, even Anzai _sensei_ straightened. Haruko slapped a hand to her mouth, a tremble travelling down to her toes.

Ever since his return from the All Japan camp, Rukawa had most definitely left all of them in his dust. He had been freshman lead, but now his ball handling, court sensibilities, and resolution of spirit anchored him among the Kanagawa greats like Maki, Sawakita, and Sendoh.

One could tell, just by the way he silently returned to the back of the line, that his focus was unwavering and implacable. He moved like a predator on the hunt, hungry for the struggle that captured his mind's eye day and night. Regardless of the state of his home team, in the approaching season, this player would dominate.

Mitsui shook out his arms, and slapped Rukawa's rear. "We get it already, superstar."

In fact, his junior's performance only fired an excitement that kept his tiredness at bay. This was what being an A team felt like, he reckoned, when the calibre of those around him demanded nothing less than excellence.

There came an audible growl.

"Watch this, fox. The _tensai_ 's full skill!"

Sakuragi barged past a smaller freshman, almost crushing his defender and eliciting a definite foul. He executed several ostentatious between-the-legs, and was just springing into smooth jump shot when Miyagi intercepted him.

The agile point guard caught the ball and flicked it around his back, out of reach of the redhead's fumbling recovery. A lay-up dropped the ball smoothly into the net.

"Welcome back to the team, Sakuragi," Miyagi grinned, regaining the bouncing sphere.

"Ryou-chan," Sakuragi whined, his face flushed with mortification and rage. "You can't do that. Kuwata-san needs to practise too," he insisted, patting his opponent with blows that knocked the breath from him, "It's unfair to stop him from learning from I, the most skillful player of Shohoku. I could have done a fadeaway if Ryou-chan hadn't meddled with my flow. Eh, old man, I'm like Michael Jordan, I can do it. Right, _jiji?_ "

He had crossed behind the bench, and was jiggling the coach's fat chin insistently.

Ayako flew over, swinging her clipboard furiously. "Behave yourself!"

Sakuragi glared balefully at Rukawa.

"I bet you can't do a turnaround shot, show-off," he sulked.

" _Dou ahou_."

Mitsui cracked up, and gestured for the ball.

"Sakuragi, there's no one here who can defend against your jumping." He shot Rukawa an almost apologetic look, before pointing at himself. "If you can beat this oldie here, _tsukemen_ is on me."

"He he, oldie," Sakuragi chanted, grinning evilly. "Mit-chi, you are in trouble. Three bowls after practice, go it?"

"Alright," Mitsui nodded agreeably. "Let's see your jump shots first." He paused. "From the three-point line."

Sakuragi's eyes bulged, but he glanced at Haruko, then at Rukawa, before acquiescing to the challenge. "Make that four bowls," he hissed, carrying off a fadeaway that bounced off the hoop. Imperceptibly, Anzai _sensei_ nodded to himself.

"Impressive," Mitsui said. He took the ball up from a dribble and plopped it through the hoop. His form was tight, graceful, as he faked several lightning-quick dodges; the turn of his eye and flip of his wrist unerringly finding that right point in time and space. Iishi kept the balls rolling towards him, and he sank them one after the other.

Net, backboard-net, rim-spin-net, net, net, net. Unconsciously, his lips curved into a smile. It was a good feeling.

"Mitsui _really_ isn't in the mood for cold ramen, huh," Miyagi remarked.

* * *

" _Nigirizushi_ sounds preferable, Sakuragi-kun," Mitsui said, gasping as he splayed onto the parquet.

The training had sucked all vitality from his limbs, and they trembled as he winked up at the towering freshman. He flinched as Sakuragi made as if to stomp on him, rolling sideways.

"Stop! Don't you dare, dental work is expensive. My two front teeth could buy three hundred bowls of ramen, brat."

"And that's three hundred bowls wasted, Mit-chi. You'll never be as handsome as I, even with all your teeth."

"What'd you say, whippersnapper? Eat my Dragon Fist!" Mitsui grabbed Sakuragi and nearly pants-ed him, to his horror-filled regret.

" _Nya nya_ , oldie," the latter taunted as he yanked his trousers free.

Mitsui would have been walloped in the face by Sakuragi's shoe, if an overwhelming force hadn't thrown him backwards by the collar. A second later, both of them collapsed to the ground, groaning and cradling boxed heads.

"Gori Fist," a sonorous voice declared, before filling the hall with its laughter.

"Brother," Haruko greeted. The team looked with surprise at the usually reserved ex-captain.

Akagi nodded and checked his mirth. "Some sixth sense told me I would be needed to mediate, Miyagi," he explained.

"You don't trust me, Akagi?" Miyagi was affronted.

"Books, or basketball?" He weighed the two in outspread palms. "It's not a choice for me, Miyagi-san. More like I can't – I can't let go of my first love."

" _Wa ha ha ha_ , Gori in love? Gori doesn't have feelings. It's impossible!" Sakuragi rolled on the floor with senseless laughter.

"I think you've completely misconstrued Akagi's passion, Sakuragi," Mitsui said dryly.

"Gori _rabu-rabu_ …" Sakuragi howled.

"Mitsui, please explain. Why do I still care," Akagi despaired, his face gloomy. The one time he came close to explaining his present dilemma, and he was met this _indignity_. Not even an additional punch would silence the delighted first-year. He vowed, "A thousand fadeaways won't redeem him in my eyes."

Mitsui stood, reaching for his isotonic drink.

"So you saw our impromptu contest." He watched as Sasaoka tried to mop around the giggling, indomitable Sakuragi. "I'm sorry to say it didn't work at all, if that isn't evident enough."

The gym doors slid open. Sakuragi, distracted, looked over at the sound, and leapt to his feet at once. "Who is this?" He bounded over.

"Kasumi-chan!" Haruko gasped.

"Hey. _O hisashiburi desu ne_." Kasumi waved a soft greeting. "You must be Sakuragi Hanamichi," she said, laughing as he patted her shaved head with an intense look on his face.

Mitsui stared. Kasumi's hair was gone, vanished into a sleek pixie cut. One side was buzzed to reveal a trim bandage above her ear. Her right hand was bound by another white one. The cut on her neck was healed to a thin scratch, while her legs were faintly blotched with healing bruises. Blue tape wrapped around one ankle. As she fended off Sakuragi's curiosity, though, it was evident to Mitsui that her movements remained hampered by other unseen injuries. Three weeks away from school hadn't been long enough, but he was inexpressibly glad to see her back at the gym.

"The haircut suits you, Kasumi-chan," Ayako remarked.

"Oh?"

"You look like a boy," Sakuragi commented.

Akagi slapped his forehead.

"I'm sorry, Akiyama-san. You had the trouble of handling the stairs by yourself. I had to leave you to deal with this troublemaker." He grasped Sakuragi's jersey. "Stop it now."

"That's alright, Akagi-san. It was no trouble." They had been watching surreptitiously from the catwalk.

During those short minutes, Akagi, to her amusement, had seemed to thrum with an unspoken torture. He had brightened as soon as he had set foot onto the court.

"I'm happy to make an acquaintance with Sakuragi-san. His input has been extremely valuable." Kasumi winked inconspicuously at Ayako. "You think I* can join the team now?"

"You're the detention student," Sakuragi realised at last, scrutinizing her. " _Wu?_ " He caught her arm and held it to his face. "What happened to your fingers? Did you get in a fight?"

"Sakuragi!" Ayako exclaimed.

Miyagi, Akagi, and Mitsui rained blows onto him and dragged him away from Kasumi. The latter was having trouble catching her breath through her chuckles. A light gleamed in her brown eyes. "What wholesome humour you have, Sakuragi-san. Teach these oldies to lighten up a bit, yes?"

Sakuragi shook off his teammates. "Half-hand-chan," he said happily. "You're my only friend behind enemy lines. And Haruko-chan, of course."

Akagi's manners balked at the nickname. "Her name is Akiyama-san!" he said, eyes bulging.

"Oh, Kasumi-san," Mitsui sighed. " _You've spilt cooking oil all over the fire_."

"Stop talking in riddles, Mit-chi!" Sakuragi yelled. "It's so rude. He's been speaking English a lot with that talentless rookie, Rukawa Kaede," he whispered to Kasumi.

"We can _hear_ you, Hanamichi," Miyagi said, as Sakuragi ducked behind Kasumi, using her as a buffer against Akagi's depleted patience.

Kasumi turned momentarily to her fellow freshman.

"Is that so?" She smiled at Mitsui, which made him glow. "That's great. Now I need only convince Miyagi-san and Sakuragi-san to be more enthusiastic."

"Eh?" Sakuragi paused.

"Stop touching your English tutor," Akagi said. "Since Kogure and I won't be able to save you guys' butts from failing, I've enlisted the help of Akiyama-san to give the basketball team remedial lessons. Mitsui–" Akagi glared at the him, for he had been about to speak, "–I am aware that she's a freshman. But she can do university papers, if you're worrying about Additional Mathematics and Advanced Bio. Which I know you've been having trouble with."

"Oh," Mitsui said feebly. Akagi was omniscient.

"This is my last responsibility as the previous captain," Akagi continued, feeling a pang of longing. "To make sure that the basketball team isn't precluded from the season because of some trifling reason like _bungled grades_."

Akagi glanced at Kasumi, Ayako, and his sister.

"Honour student league, I leave this in your hands."

"Roger." Kasumi touched two fingers to her temple.

"Does this meet your support, _kyaputen_?"

"I, the future captain, have no problems," Sakuragi chimed in.

"And _I_ , the one who will choose the future captain, agree." Miyagi turned around eagerly. "Aya-chan, I actually have some Physics homework that I can't solve."

Mitsui caught Rukawa rolling his eyes skyward in disgust, and was this close to following suit. Instead, he tossed his empty bottle at Miyagi's head.

"Miyagi, your heart is bleeding," he called.

"You pipe down," Miyagi said automatically, slapping the bottle into the ground.

* _boku_ (male personal pronoun)


	20. Chapter 20

"You know, you _don't_ look like a boy," Mitsui said. He bolted the gate to Seishiro's house, and followed Kasumi as she walked slowly down the street.

"That wasn't at the top of my head, but my restless heart lies in peace now." Kasumi pressed a hand to her chest. "Thank you, Mitsui-san. Your unsurpassed powers of observation have saved me from many sleepless nights of wondering if I look feminine enough for no one whosoever."

"You're frustratingly stuck in an unabiding belief of your own lack of appeal," Mitsui said.

"If you mean I have more important things in life than vanity to think about, irrevocably yes."

"I told you, that Nakamura from my class is obsessed with you. Oh, and Shinji from the athletics club, the top scorer Uyeno, Kataoka _sensei_ , and maybe a third of the judo and swim team each."

"That's disgusting," Kasumi said flatly. "I've met – perhaps five of them? And that was when they tried to mass-coerce girls to wear their female swim uniform during the _bunka-sai_. Nearly a year ago."

Mitsui laughed.

"If I didn't know better, I'd expect you to end up a bitter old spinster."

Kasumi waved her fingers. "Fare thee well, all the boys supposedly pining after mine own heart. Or should I assume that they only want me for my body?"

Mitsui blushed. It was at these times that he was unused to her occasionally dichotomous approach. Most of the time, Kasumi conformed faultlessly to etiquette, undistinguished from her peers in mannerism, and probably more polite. Regardless, she remained unafraid to point things out as they stood, even if they toed the line to explicit. It wasn't the crass banter among pubescent males, however, but more in the form of a dry and subtle remark.

After training that day, following the announcement of Akagi's academic plans for his old club, the squad had invaded a _sushi-ya_. Once ascertaining that everyone was agreeable, Kasumi had called Seishiro and invited him to join their meal. The boy had insisted that his mother had already prepared dinner, but Kasumi had cajoled him until his resolution broke.

He arrived at the small restaurant, and almost left at the sight of the tall players crowded into the booths like enoki. One, with hair as red as a _kochia_ bush, dominated one side with his noisy antics, while the tallest Japanese he had ever seen stuck out at the other. From the former, Kasumi stuck out a hand and waved him over.

Seishiro recognised the intimidating boy who was squashed next to Akagi, and noticed that Kasumi and him shared the same ease of companionship that he himself did with her after years of knowing each other. Mitsui knew just how to tease a laugh from her, and she finished everything that he offered her to try.

"That's the most I've seen you eat," Seishiro commented as they left among cries of _gochisosama deshita_.

"Half-hand-chan eats like a baby chicken," Sakuragi contributed. "No, worse. Like a mouse. She doesn't even know how to eat pickled ginger or mackerel." He had polished off a container of _gari_ by himself, and was miffed that anyone else would not enjoy these strong-tasting elements.

"I tried Mitsui-san's _saba_ ," Kasumi pointed out.

"A piece the size of my fingernail," Seishiro said, holding out his little finger. "Still, better than the days when _chuka idako_ in your _obento_ gave you literal nightmares."

"Baby octopi?" Mitsui grinned, amused by the thought of a younger Kasumi screaming and spilling her lunch at the glimpse of miniature tentacles.

"Only because you replaced them with red plastic spiders once, yes, Sei-chan?"

"True."

"Sei-chan is a prankster?" Sakuragi darted to his side. Seishiro had long since realised that he had no respect for boundaries, imitating Kasumi's term of endearment for him. "Teach me, Sei-chan." He eyed Miyagi's back distrustfully. In the middle of the meal, the captain had declared a ban on his consumption of _anago_ as the numbers had run beyond the tens. "Ryou-chan deserves to be paid back for letting me starve."

Interrupting his chatter with Ayako, Miyagi hollered, "I can _hear_ you, Hanamichi."

"This isn't the first time, either, Sei-chan. Last time at the dipping ramen place, him and Mit-chi lied that they only had 200 yen each. And then they went to buy crepes for dessert. Without poor me."

Miyagi was livid. "I _paid_ for half of your meal just now, and for the noodles that time!"

Sakuragi was perpetually broke, yet ate for two people at every sitting. Miyagi thought it _someone's_ responsibility to keep the kid off the streets, or having the clothes off his back to pay the restaurateurs, besides a sheepish grin and the flash of empty pockets; and it had fallen to him to keep his rampant friend in check.

This night was no different, although Sakuragi had lost in the shooting match; as expected, he had wriggled out of the bill. Mitsui had insisted on paying for Seishiro and Kasumi's shares, although the combined cost had taken up an entire week's allowance. He thought it only decent, and waved off their fervent thanks, which secretly stoked a warmth in his belly.

Now, Mitsui stretched his arms to the sky as they passed through the darkened neighbourhood. He relished the opportunity to stretch his legs, despite the slow pace they had adopted due to Kasumi's ankle, for the dinner had been a more than hearty one. It suddenly came to mind that, not too far from here, probably unlit and completely quiet, the side street where the first fateful incident had taken place lay under the night sky beside that shushing grass field. He cast a glance down at the girl beside him in silent realization: they were, undoubtedly, strangers no longer.

Before he had left Seishiro on his doorstep, the latter had touched his elbow silently. He eyed Kasumi, who waved goodbye to him from the street, and turned her face away to catch the last purple vestiges of the sunset in the sky.

"Norohiko-san?" Mitsui asked deferentially.

The thin youth bowed slightly. "Thank you for treating me to the meal. It was not your duty to do so."

Mitsui inclined his head, a touch of a smile gracing his face. He remembered, not too long ago, when he too had uttered something similar. "You're very welcome."

"Kasumi…" Seishiro cleared his throat. "Kasumi has not told me what happened. It was a shock when I heard that she had been hospitalized. Do you know?"

Mitsui straightened, and gazed frankly at him. He was aware that it took Seishiro a great deal not to show any jealousy as a result of their shared acquaintance, especially whom each held so dear. It was often thus that one or the other strives to prove that theirs is the stronger and more robust link; so Mitsui respected Seishiro for placing Kasumi before any of his own emotions, and rose above any petty acts of spite.

"I have an inkling, but it would not be right for me to postulate. I once thought that telling the horse to break out of its bridle would give it the strength it needed. But I think you, as well as I, will have to wait to hear it directly, according to its time."

"You will give me nothing? It's the one time…" Seishiro passed a hand over his face.

 _The one time she didn't come to me first_ , he thought. He had agonized many long, lonely minutes by her bed as she slept. The skin under her eyes had been had been smudged plum, and her hands limp on the white duvet. He cleaned the crust off her fingers and changed the gauze on her head wound. When was the last time he had seen her so helpless? Seishiro thought. He couldn't remember. Maybe never.

One of those nights, Kasumi had forgotten to remove the gold choker. It rested on her neck, sparkling as it rose and fell with the bellows of her lungs. He stared at it, enervated, then at the contours of her face in the dimness of the room lit only by the residual glow of a streetlamp. The face that had brought him great joy and distress in equal parts in the time they had known each other.

Kasumi had first acknowledged him for his unusually tender disposition; she had found him in a paroxysm of tears after he had accidentally smote a baby bird to death amongst some ferns by the school pond. She had not mocked him, but helped him bury the broken creature under some leaf litter, and telling him, in her unassuming manner, how the bird's corporeal body would be reabsorbed by the earth, and its atoms recycled to live on in other living things. The confident attitude by which she owned up to the things in life was antithetical to his neurosis, and counteracted it.

Seishiro, not much able to communicate effectively with other boys his age, had introduced Kasumi with a childlike enthusiasm to his passion of reading, once he knew that she would not condemn him for who he was. An uncountable number of hours they had spent perusing a multitude of different volumes, and she had him to thank for her love of words, and her failure to be intimidated by knowledge presented in those thick, academic journals. She had only to remind herself of what Seishiro had said, that words were meant to be read and not feared, and she would forge on, delighting in the knowledge that could be accrued from marks and scratches on a page.

The necklace Seishiro had given her when they had graduated from middle school. He was skipping two grades, as a result of intellect and incessant application in cram school, and entering an all-male _gakuen_ as a senior.

"Sei-chan, you know I don't have anything to give you," Kasumi laughed as she clipped on the choker, "only my heartfelt and light blessing. Go out of this cage – fly, and be free, my dove." And she had kissed him on the brow, as only those who are forever children at heart can.

Her lyrical farewell stayed with Seishiro, as clear as the day it was uttered. "I'll never be free, Kasumi," he whispered. "People come into my life, and take pieces of my heart. The longer I walk this path of life, the more burdened I become."

Seishiro looked like a mourner kneeling by the bed of the deceased. And, in a sense, it was true; he felt his conception of their friendship passing away, transforming, no longer one that he wore like a second skin and took for granted. This transmutation wasn't painless, but one so gradual its effects received only with a belated and bemused admission. Despite his worldly knowledge, Seishiro had only come to terms with the tip of the glacier of human relationships; he would learn in the future that such territory shifted much quicker than age-old ice, too.

"Norohiko-san, the one time what?" Mitsui's voice brought him to reality.

Seishiro shook his head in disappointment at his own shallow attitude, and the dust of memory he dispelled also. He wasn't a child, squabbling over a toy. As long as Kasumi was happy, and safe, what else had he to trouble Mitsui with? He rubbed his face again, and looked again at the older boy.

"Mitsui-san, I leave her in your hands."

Seishiro waited until Mitsui nodded, his face inscrutable.

"Excuse me. I have taken up enough of your time." Seishiro bowed again, and he carried himself away to the croon of a divergent wind.


	21. Chapter 21

"Can we keep walking, Mitsui-san?" They had reached the train station, and their shadows stretched long in the fluorescent lighting. Kasumi's murmured request came unexpectedly. She tugged her jacket around her school uniform. "Of course, if you have a curfew, and I understand that seniors have a heavier workload…"

Mitsui shook his head. It was only 9p.m. "Of course. If your ankle can take it."

"This pace is fine." They proceeded to tread down the road, passing several establishments. A LAN café, several _izakaya_ joints, a public bath on the corner with a classical landscape painting on its _noren_ indicated the blue serenity to be found within. The day had cooled to a comfortable temperature, but the atmosphere dipped as they turned onto an avenue lined with trees.

"What do you think of Sei-chan, Mitsui-san?" Kasumi said.

A thick, unkempt mat of jasmine bushes added to the greenery, the white and pale yellow flowers sprinkled among the glossy emerald leaves. They infused the air with a lingering perfume.

"Whoa, that's a huge question," Mitsui said. He swung his bag over one shoulder. "Norohiko-san is a sensitive person. Empathetic."

"He said something to you," Kasumi said. She wasn't guessing.

"Yeah." They were content to walk in silence.

"You're not going to give me anything?" she asked.

"Private and classified correspondence," Mitsui declared.

"Fine." She swept a few fallen blooms from the ground as they walked, and put them to her nose. "I don't believe that one should bare all, either."

A torrid image popped into Mitsui's mind. "What an interesting… opinion," he finished quickly. "You don't think that, in a relationship, one needs to reach a point of knowing someone inside out? I mean that purely on platonic grounds."

"Inside out, wide and deep, back and forth… What is a relationship but the tiny moments accumulated together, along the irreversible continuum of time? Here, open your hand." Kasumi dropped the jasmine flowers into Mitsui's palm. "What do they smell like?"

Mitsui lifted them to his face and inhaled. "Sweet, but with more complex notes."

Kasumi cocked her head, and continued to stare at him expectantly. He reached for his poet's soul.

"Like nimble fingers running over cream-coloured piano keys. A tune lingering and powerful, for a warrior in battle-stained armour come to warm his feet by the fireplace. A flower of the night." Mitsui was gratified by a smile.

"How will you remember this moment?" she asked. "As I am talking to you, the pattern of a memory crystallises in your brain: how I make you feel as I speak, the placement of my hands, the micro-expressions of my face."

Kasumi's voice was akin to rivulets of fine white sand, running over the crags of his chest, belly, and thighs. He noticed a small mole just under one of her eyes, and a tiny, tiny cleft in her glossy bottom lip where it had been torn.

"You see, another _I_ exists apart from myself, an _I_ of memories. An _I_ that I wouldn't know. You say you know me by the feeling you apply to this knowledge. But a memory changes each time you draw upon it. The crystal evolves. Therefore an _I_ that isn't me exists in your brain. I, as an autonomous being, and that Mitsui-san-I, may progress in tandem, in parallel, in alignment, but they will never, ever be the same. How, then, can you say to know someone else inside out?"

Mitsui could walk all night by the cadence of her mild words. His hands worked as he tried to strain through the thoughts her argument had aroused.

"Epistemological notions of memory and consciousness make a conflicting sea. You therefore propose that no knowledge can ever be passed on in its pure form. Even as I create this relationship with you, it stands on a history that shifts like a house built on sand, and its inhabitants spectres merely rubbing elbows with each other." He paused. "Maybe not sand. More like a house built on shale, with shifting layers." He was sure Kasumi would appreciate the allusion to what little knowledge he had gathered at the florist's.

The streetlights ribbed the road with alternating windows of orange and dark. The land rose a little as they passed among several two- or three-storied apartment buildings. Someone exited a driveway to check his mailbox. Washing hung limp and ghostly from balcony railings, between clusters of large house plants.

Kasumi had yet to digest the implications of his response, but she was, for now, content to be impressed by his eloquence. His quick perception of the philosophical concepts that she had thrown out grew her excitement at the thought of being able to coax his intellect into its full.

Really, she ought to have been more grateful to Akagi for dragging her into his scheme; no doubt Miyagi and Rukawa could be stimulated as well. As for Sakuragi, she would have to spend more time with him to guess which type of teaching style he would best respond to. Everything considered, the 'red mark' team could very well find a synergy off court as they did on it.

"What is knowledge anyway? Can it be pure? Can any thought be original, so to speak," Kasumi wondered softly.

"I don't know," Mitsui said simply.

She glanced at him.

"Mitsui-san, I really liked your analogy of the house and its spectres. And I don't expect anyone to be able to answer questions such as these. I'm only babbling."

"Oh, you can babble all you want, Kasumi-san." Mitsui finished the artifact wrapped around his fingers. "For what it's worth, I think there's a danger in being too cynical, or perpetually trapped in intellection. Some things of the heart stand truer. Us humans were made to be fallible creatures, and we often find delight in our silly, foolish little moments. _Here–_ "

He lay the white flower chain onto Kasumi's head.

 _"–_ _a bagatelle to crown a bright, bonny lass. Humour me. It's an irreconcilable paradox_."

The esteemed reader must pause at this juncture, and offer a moment of recognition for how far the basketball player had exceeded the expectations that his English teacher, Kataoka _sensei_ , had any reason to impose upon him. Not a lick of that reticent, stuttering reader remained in that tall frame, which cerebrum had managed to produce a joke relatively comparable to a rabbit mastering phrenology. How passion fuels the imagination, and eagerness to please gilts tongues!

It would have been the most romantic moment, had not said lassie felt an overpowering need to foil Mitsui's genius.

"Oh, Mitsui-san, _continue to whisper your precious English sophistications to me_ ," Kasumi said, smiling sweetly and clasping her hands together.

Mitsui almost tripped. He was struck by the way that she looked at him with such an open expression: chin dimpled, lips parted with pleasant surprise.

"I…"

She continued, " _If only you could know how my heart leaps so in my breast; foolish, foolish desire!_ I can see that A grade of yours within reach."

"Intolerable," Mitsui retorted, and plucked the flower crown away. "This cursed thing shall be destroyed."

"No!" Kasumi tried to snatch it back from Mitsui. "It becomes me, Mitsui-san, does it not? Deliver me from my destiny of a miserable spinster."

He could not disagree. The beatific turn of Kasumi's mouth further persuaded him to leave the jasmine flowers like so many soft pearls in her hair.

* * *

Continuing in the same unburdened manner the two wended through the unfamiliar locale, the night settling comfortably over its nooks and vacant arterial streets. The modulations of their dialogue were subdued by the falling blanket of restfulness, but Kasumi's words trilled brightly nonetheless, Mitsui's deeper bass barks evincing their shared engagement.

"The number of times I've considered the existence of a hip hop-loving emergency nurse," Mitsui said, "is never."

"Itoh-san made the decision for me while I was out of it in the emergency room." Kasumi tilted her head and ran a finger along the line of the side shave. "She said she'd always wanted to try the hairstyle, but was never brave enough to do it on herself."

"So she tried it on an addled patient?"

"She could, and she did." Kasumi stifled a laugh. "She even showed me the photo that inspired it the following day."

"Damned if I don't admire her for it," Mitsui admitted.

"You're not alone," Kasumi said, sweeping her bangs to the side. "Actually, I shall add some Salt-N-Pepa videos into the remedial syllabus. _You guys would go out of your minds_."

She smiled inwardly, thinking about how Rukawa would react. He would most likely flip open his notebook in that levelheaded way, and inscribe more slang terms under the existing list of colloquialisms, enunciating the syllables below his breath. She knew he was excited whenever that ratty notebook came out.

Mitsui remained quiet. He was thinking that Kasumi was very good with entertaining people by her little anecdotes, but he never really knew her part in them; it was as if she had incised herself out of these memories, preserving them for the sake of small talk without revealing anything of that past _I_. He supposed that Kasumi had Seniichi clinging to her back like a macaque; having had anything that she said used against her accounted for this unconscious inclination.

"How was recovery, though?" he asked.

"Hmm?"

"You didn't tell me that you had to go to the hospital, remember."

The memory of Mitsui's censure and the _gong_ of the cistern seized Kasumi.

"Yes," she said levelly. "I'm not sorry about that; it was only three days."

He made a sound of frustration, and tried very hard not to reproach her. "I've _been_ hospitalized, and I know you wouldn't go in for no reason."

Kasumi touched his hand, and Mitsui lapsed into silence as she quickened her step. A white glow infused the air above the houses in the adjacent street. They arrived at a corner piloted by a defunct traffic light, which framed the oncoming road like a dread portal. One van trundled past them, its engine rattling loudly. Here they stopped, and Mitsui could see one side of a chain link fence under the luminosity of the court lights. As he caught a glimpse of Kasumi's face, he understood at once.

It was a long while before she roused.

"I wish you had been there with me."

Mitsui continued to gaze at the distant basketball court, not wishing to spook her, but her words stirred him.

"There was nowhere to run, or I would never have been 'brave' enough to face up to them. It was the gang from Seishiro's _gakuen_ , and some others with motorbikes. One of them they called Steel, and he had a mullet even more quintessentially 1980s than my hairdo."

 _Tetsuo?_ Mitsui thought, feeling horror writhe in his chest. He could not acknowledge her humour.

"The gang caught me and held me against the fence, and he conducted a very straightforward interview. The leader gave me a head-butt for punching him–" Kasumi touched her mouth "–and one of his guys wore a ring which grazed me on the neck. I blacked out after they left me. I think I cut my head on some sharp corner of the wire when I fell. Mother refused to let me stay at home because the headache and nausea continued for a day or so. She was right, as usual. The doctor gave me a few stitches for the scalp wound, too, and confined me to bed for fractured ribs and concussion."

Mitsui swallowed past the dryness in his throat.

"I… I wish I'd been there to help."

When had Tetsuo switched over? He would gut that traitor first and interrogate him after, God damn it.

"No, Mitsui-san. It was wrong of me to say that." Kasumi ducked her head and scuffed a heel against the curb. "Then we'd both have been beaten up."

Her logic was undeniable.

"You've left your gang days behind, haven't you?"

Mitsui dropped his chin to his chest. "Yes."

"This is only a reprieve," she said pointedly. "They _will_ run you down for your disrespect."

 _And probably murder me, I know_ , Mitsui thought. When he had gone down the path of delinquency, he had never cared to consider the possible ramifications it would have on his family, friends, or sporting career. The thought of Kasumi's suffering on his behalf troubled him much more than his own endangerment.

"No fear. Even with the Dragoness' granddaughter indisposed, I have Hotto-kun and my old friends. Sakuragi, too, probably." It was a secret kept within the basketball club, but Sakuragi had already destroyed Steel once.

"Hotto-kun?"

Mitsui thought for a moment. "The noisy one who waves the 'Mit-chan' banner at the games."

"Ah. You two must be close."

"Yeah." A note of embarrassed pride tinged his reply. He had never mentioned to Hotto how valuable his cheering had been to the team, and made a mental note to do so as soon as he could by paying him a visit at his after-school workplace with a drink, or some sort.

Kasumi noticed the affection that stained Mitsui's cheeks, and was glad for it.

"Come on, Mitsui-san. Let's leave."


	22. Chapter 22

"No. Let's go this way instead, Kasumi-san." Mitsui caught her sleeve, and tugged her towards Shohoku High. "If you would let me take up more of your time."

"No, that's not the problem." As he let go of her, Kasumi took in the darkened school gates. "Why are we back here?" There was a jangle as Mitsui extracted several keys from his bag. She raised her hands into the air. "Let it be heard: I do not consent to be Mitsui-san's accomplice. I have no knowledge of his nefarious plans, and never have. I acquit myself fully of this lawlessness."

"Oh, be quiet." Mitsui ushered her through the narrow side egress. "How do you think I come in at five in the morning to practise? The janitor gave me a copy of his keys."

"Entering school grounds for an honest workout," she responded, "is different from breaking in at ten at night,"

"We _didn't_ break in." Mitsui shut the gate and led them around the gymnasium.

"Unconsented entry."

"I really like you, Kasumi-san, but I absolutely can't stand you at times like these."

She coloured. "You're not. _I_ stand by truth."

"I can't hear you!" He clapped his hands over his ears. "The Mitsui-san-you stands otherwise."

"Intolerable." Kasumi flung out his usual insult.

Mitsui grinned, catching her doing the same but trying to smother it.

"I see that." He pointed an accusing finger at her. "You accede?"

" _Argh_." She pulled ahead. "I accede."

It was a quick task for Mitsui to retrieve several balls from the clubroom, as Kasumi switched on half of the lamps within the cavern of the gym. Only one court was illuminated, while the surrounding area remained steeped in darkness. There was no use for the entire facility, in any case, if it was just Mitsui who wanted to train in an informal way.

Kasumi waited on the bench for him to return. She kicked off her shoes, extending one leg to rotate the injured ankle slowly. She counted off the exercises that she had promised the doctor to complete daily.

"One thing has been bothering me, Kasumi-san." Mitsui came through the doors with three balls, one spinning on each hand and the remaining balanced atop his head.

Kasumi turned and smiled. "Pass me one."

Mitsui complied, and she received the ball more than competently, where it continued its rapid revolutions on the tip of her pointer finger.

"That's exactly it."

Kasumi flicked her gaze to him as he walked up to the court.

"You're a liar."

"I admitted as much that time."

"Not about basketball."

Mitsui began to stretch, running quickly through several warm-ups. He was alright with Kasumi watching him unobtrusively from the sideline. He knew very well that she had to have her own space, and there was no use imposing his time on her. Her forthcoming was cultivated by patience.

Just as well, Mitsui thought, for basketball was also about knowing the rhythms of the play, and not rushing while in possession, listening to that calm, innate consciousness which told his body how and when to go.

The murmur spoke to him now as he trained his eyes on the gleaming backboard. The rim shook minimally as the balls slipped through the net. Mitsui breathed evenly through the repeated bend-leap-snap of his shooting form. Thousands of identical reps had synched his muscles to that inward sense, such that he could respond in an instant from any defensive stance or fast break pass. Mitsui slipped into a place of flow, where the perception of time is lost.

The echoes of his dribbling masked Kasumi's voice. In his peripheral vision, Mitsui saw her mouth move.

"Join me," he said, without hearing.

Kasumi rose from her seat, magnetised by his effortless glow. The power coiling through his carriage was evident as Mitsui sprinted to gather the balls. They heeded his graceful manouevres, just as he tuned himself to their trajectories. In those few seconds that he herded the two balls towards her, he danced with them in a series of seamless transitions. Low to high dribble, alternating waist-highs, and front and back crossovers, the blurred spheres deceptively obedient.

"Go." Mitsui gently floated a ball to her.

Kasumi received with her left hand, a chill racing through her limbs as she felt Mitsui's gaze follow the movement of her arm. She had never played for anyone like this, and the fact that she was currently handicapped did not improve her situation. Yet, despite being of a much lower level compared to Mitsui, she did not feel a need to hide away.

At last, Kasumi was no more trying to pretend that she was good at basketball as much as she did not know anything about it; she knew that, by bringing her here, Mitsui acknowledged unquestioningly her ability to play basketball, and was only offering her an opportunity to share it.

Kasumi palmed the ball with her right hand, sending jolts of feeling through the stumps of her fingers. It wasn't pain, more like tenderness, and it wasn't unbearable. She walked to the free throw line, leading the ball alongside her, flexing her wrists with a V-shaped dribble around the front and to the sides.

When she felt more at ease, she planted and released. The ball hit the glass and dropped in. _Lucky first_. Her percentage had never risen above fifty, and today was no exception.

There was a lull as Mitsui gave chase after a ball that ricocheted off the breakaway rim. As he whipped around to face the basket, he sprang off his toes and arced the ball into the air. The fadeaway sank with a quiet _pff_.

The image of his form hanging in the air seized Kasumi wholly. What triumphs, what heartbreak, what pain, and what anger had he worked through to be able to soar so high and so bright still? That sure-footed, padded landing and unbroken gaze reserved only for his time on the court, a time governed by an activity that had devoted his entire soul to regain.

Kasumi was unable to speak. This was what love looked like. He didn't have to say anything at all.

Mitsui met her gaze as he jogged up to her.

"Kasumi-san?" His voice was soft. His dark eyes seemed to fall away into a question as he tipped his head sideways. "You can read my movements. You understand how the game works." He traced the column of her back, smoothing a palm against her spine. "If you try to loosen up a bit more, and the pain isn't too great, you'll be able to guide the ball closer to the basket."

As Kasumi had watched him from the bench just now, she had said, "Can you teach me?"

"Keep your eyes on the glass," Mitsui said, removing his hand.

"Keep your eyes…"

 _On the horizon_.

* * *

"Two eyes on the horizon, and a third on the motor," Dad said, "and that passage will be wide open."

"I don't have three eyes, Dad!" The engine thrummed under Kasumi's hand.

The man squinted at the sparkling lake waters as he estimated the four-foot channel.

"Listen, little one." He laughed. "As long as you don't scupper her, we'll be fine."

"Dad, I'm scared."

"Wide open," he promised, and threw the ignition to third gear.

The sound of his wind-whipped laughter rang in Kasumi's ears as she slewed the boat between outcrops of rock, and straight out into free, open water.

"See, you rapscallion," Dad said, grabbing the nape of her neck and giving her a playful shake as she yelped in protest. "You remember what I said?"

"Three eyes." Kasumi grinned. Her heart rabbited in her body. "Two on the horizon, and one on the motor."

He winked. "You got it, little one."

* * *

The flip of her wrist coaxed the ball through the mouth of the basket. _Swish_.

Mitsui gave a whistle of delight.

"Straight through. Damn!" he laughed. " _You got it_ , Kasumi-san."

"I do?" Her voice broke. She couldn't turn her head fast enough to hide her tears.

Mitsui's smile vanished. "Kasumi?"

"Ah, fuck." Kasumi wiped at her face frantically. The memory had broken something within her, and she didn't know what. She didn't know how to stop it.

Mitsui reached automatically for his handkerchief, but found none in his pocket. Kasumi had not returned it to him. His fingers continued to grip the basketball, knuckles pale, as he watched the back of her hands become slick with tears.

"Mitsui-san, I just remembered the first time Father taught me how to pilot a boat." A laugh broke out of Kasumi, apologetic, bittersweet. "Father had three loves: the water, fishing, and basketball. He used to mail me tapes of every NBA game, every season. I studied the starters and rookies of the Bulls and the Knicks: their strengths and weaknesses, field goal attempts, shooting percentages, rebound rate. I watched every last recording. They were, they _are_ , his favourite teams." She inhaled shakily. "The year after I began to play basketball, my parents divorced. When Mother brought me here, there was no basketball team in junior high. I continued to practise by myself."

Her father had always reserved the most enthusiasm for Kasumi's involvement in basketball. In that fleeting period, he attended each training, home game, and road game with alacrity. The lodge house he availed one year to the club for a summer retreat. The remembrance of thirteen scampering girls filling the house with their lively cries, pissing her brother off, hogging the motorboat for riverine adventures, polishing off cucumber sandwiches by the trayful, and playing basketball together on a rough-swept patch of land with only one net – Kasumi recognised, now, that perhaps Dad had been only denying the inevitable, and savouring what he knew was only temporary.

Was it cruelty, that she had never felt closer to him than in the face of their impending separation? If she knew this, if she had known that her parents were going to part ways, she would have fought. She would have fought. But the news had been delivered like a stunning blow, and dragged her onto a cold tube of aluminium, benumbed.

"Father was great at teaching. Motoring the boat, marine navigation, reading the stars and winds. I took comfort that the same moon, those same constellations, watched over me as I continued to play basketball solo. I was unwilling to lose that connection the shared love of the sport gave the two of us. Him booming from the sidelines, twenty places at once; teaching me how to drive stick shift on his lap en route to an away game; popping kernels on the stove, and adding maple syrup to his popcorn before TV playoffs. He was my backseat coach, my game supporter, my mentor."

To have that torn away from you, Mitsui thought, was a thousand times worse than the lancing pain that had afflicted his knee once. What can replace a father? How could he empathise?

"When I went back last spring, he'd thrown away his VCR. And then the accident happened, and I stopped."

For several heartbeats, they merely stood before each other, breathing. One elephant, two elephants, three… Then Kasumi hitched Mitsui a tentative, bleary smile.

"I guess I was remembering, just how happy I'd been. And how happy I am in this moment, despite all that's happened between then and now. Playing by myself was never enough. And then, to have met the entire basketball club, to have met you, Mitsui-san… I've done nothing to deserve this. Nothing at all. I –"

Kasumi halted. It made her acutely self-conscious as she perceived these things, for, in doing so, she had to acknowledge her utter lack of wisdom in being a human being, caught between the casual tides of sentiment and tragedy.

How stupid she was, Kasumi thought of herself, how obtuse, how simple. How weak. At her young age, she was already aware that few were able to face the ugliest side of another, and not be repulsed by it. She was absurdly grateful for Mitsui's stoic presence.

"–I've felt lonely for the past four years. But I don't any more. I don't."

Tiptoeing, Kasumi cradled Mitsui's face in two hands. One was velvet-warm, the other the bright coolness of gauze. Her face remained subdued, but her eyes shone with an inner elation that could not be concealed.

Drawing Mitsui to her, Kasumi placed a careful kiss on his forehead. The moisture of her lips and tears lingered on his skin as she pulled away.

Never had Kasumi looked as radiant as she did now, Mitsui thought, still. Her vulnerability, her trust, this intimacy – she captured all his senses. _I might never truly know everything about her_ , Mitsui thought. He could talk with her for a thousand hours, and only realise just how much more she had left unspoken.

Mitsui dropped the ball onto his foot, and let it roll away silently. He reached out and slipped his hands around Kasumi's waist, pulling her closer. Her forehead tipped into his chest, and he felt her grip his hips, tentative fingers on bone.

Something about their bond wakened within him a longing for that which he would once have put down as an idle and worthless pastime: an unfamiliar desire to spend time in languorous conversation or wordless communion. Keeping count of how many times clouds would obscure this featureless square in the sky during lunch breaks; or throwing out conjectures about commuters strolling along the pavement past the shop window; or abandoning their work at once upon hearing the _yaki-imo_ jingle in the distance, Mitsui grabbing her hand and urging her to a faster pace as they sprinted over the tarmac, Kasumi laughing helplessly at the sight of his unbuckled overalls sagging alarmingly with each step.

It was inevitable that, during such mellow times, their exchanges would take a turn for the profound; Kasumi had remarked, once, that she enjoyed his company very much, but he was more often enlightened by the way she viewed the world.

He was new to this, too; the sensation of holding someone in his arms, the form so different, unfamiliar, yet comforting – the warmth of a cup of _ocha_ whilst a flurry of wind chased snowflakes across the window. In this bubble of stillness, Mitsui had made a choice to face up to a tough situation: the hesitant flowering of her person, the crises Kasumi had borne, and the reasons behind each tear she shed he accepted without judgment. By his forbearing presence, rather uncommon among the male sex of his age and circumstances, Mitsui had thus shown himself worthy of her vulnerability a hundred times over.

"So you're finally ready," he said.

Kasumi felt him smile, although she couldn't see his face. Something about the loosening of his shoulders, his fingers tracing waves against the small of her back, hinted at it. The fullness in her heart threatened to burst; Kasumi could only bite her lip and nod.

"To stop calling me Mitsui-san."

"Wh…" Kasumi made a small sound of confusion against his shirt. "No!"

"Then I won't play with you." Mitsui tightened his hold on her playfully.

She was speechless, but only for a moment.

"Black-hearted bastard."

Kasumi twisted out of his embrace and backpedalled furiously, almost rolling her ankle as she whipped a stray ball at his face.

" _Tsk_." Mitsui deflected it effortlessly. "Kasumi-san, your foolhardy ways will kill you before long."

"And I'll be the first one buying indemnity from God against your 'affectionate care' in my second life," she riposted, holding her side.

"To my knowledge, cockroaches aren't eligible for insurance."

Unbeatable, Kasumi thought. And unbearable. Tonight this boy was on a _roll_.

Mitsui threw a grin. "Oh? Nothing coming?"

"I've just – spilled my heart to you." Kasumi blushed furiously. "It might be a little too much to ask for light-hearted banter right now, yes?"

His eyes widened. "Why do I not believe you?"

"You're right." She wiped off the traces of memory from her face, and signalled for a ball. "I was just saving my energy to kick your ass."


	23. Chapter 23

"What I wanted to know was, why me?" Mitsui tilted his head upwards. "I was consistently shooting in the seventies, eighties. The court was my second home. Our team was the middle school district champion. Who decided to crumble it all to nothing?"

High above them, the quilt of stars was a spray of silver jewels on sumptuous dark velvet. The boat rocked gently, the sloshing of water against its hull the only sound. The silence was not present to be filled, for there were no expectations for this dialogue; Mitsui only had to follow the itching paths of thought his fancy led him thereon.

"I know what you felt. When you had to lie on that hospital bed, taking painkillers and enduring. The life _before_ dissipating too quickly, already a passing dream." Mitsui reached out and tapped Kasumi's mutilated hand. "Although, I would never say that the knee injury could be compared to what you've experienced."

"I know." Kasumi shook her head. "But one's suffering is not diminished by the magnitude of another's."

Mitsui laughed. "Ha, and did I take full advantage of _that_. Two years blaming everything else but my own stubbornness."

"Would you say you've recovered?"

"Recovered?" Mitsui looked at her. He could barely make out her eyes, nose, and mouth, for the moonless night rendered everything amorphous. She nodded.

"We've mourned it. We've been sleepless. And now we've both faced up to losing basketball."

Mitsui nodded almost imperceptibly. "It's hard to say. The Inter Highs were a huge revelation. Every game was, and continues to be, a lesson in humility."

"Do you measure your passion for basketball by achievements?"

"Of course. I don't mean medals, cups, or popularity. Another extra push-up, a new dribbling technique to master, an effective fake on a defender – it's easy to overlook these increments."

"You're content," Kasumi summarized. "Even if your sporting career were as placid as the lake–" she spread a hand to indicate the vastness of the water "–no competition wins, no recognition, you'd still be coming back to it. Without fail."

"Honestly," Mitsui said, "it's more of an instance where I haven't encountered anything to love better than basketball."

Coalescing from the darkness, Blagden alighted on a gunwale near Kasumi. He uttered a demure caw as she lifted a finger to stroke his gleaming wings.

"My interest in it was narrow, exclusive, precluding. I'm deep enough that basketball has uncovered its most inner joys to me: motivations and simple pleasure which others might find hard to fathom. I've never committed to anything else to the same extent. That's why picking other routes, perhaps going into university for a degree in material sciences, or chemical engineering, seems like such a fraud. I have a hypothesis for this." Kasumi raised an eyebrow, and they exchanged smiles. "These things won't reveal themselves to us unless we engage in some kind of titanic struggle, where we break apart all that we thought we knew, and somehow draw back together with a new frame of mind that accommodates for the pursuit that cannot care whither we choose it, or fall away."

Mitsui straightened, and with his fingertips sprinkled water at Blagden.

"So I know I've found the code for basketball, and for me it'll never change."

He watched the crow wing away in silence.

"I think the MVP recognition did make me realise what exactly I loved about basketball, but not in a way I could have anticipated. It subsumed my identity and elevated me to the paragon that everyone assumed I was. And when the would-be 'conqueror of the nation' no longer had a claim to it, when he felt the pedestal crumbling, he had longer to fall."

His legs had been cut out from under him, almost literally. In his days as a delinquent, if he caught a glimpse of an ambulance, or passed by the hospital, Mitsui had been seized with a crippling recollection of helplessness; rest had been agony, and the whispered sympathies of his ex-teammates a parody of sentiment. Thank God it's not me, he thought they were all thinking. Not me, not me… and that was when he began to imagine what it would feel like to dash the water jug at their faces. To see the red painted on their skin like how his soul raged against the injustice of their altered positions. And so Mitsui had allowed this sepsis of resent to fester and swell inside him, a malignant toxin replacing his blood.

Something tickled Mitsui's chin. Kasumi stroked the side of his face, persuading him to return from his reminiscence.

"Tell me about one of those inner joys. A moment with basketball that altered your attitude in an important way." She settled back on her bench.

"The hypothesis I mentioned just now might have been a bit unclear," Mitsui amended. "Basketball isn't a nebulous, unfeeling, alien form. The sport recreates itself; its legacy is continued by the people who choose to be involved in it. Rarely do we reach that deep place of contentment without those people to guide us: feeling for sharp protrusions, warning of its quirks, and counselling how best to harness yourself for the journey.

"I can say it was Anzai _sensei_ who anointed me. With twelve seconds on the clock, he told me with certainty that the game was not over. More important than winning that match, I saw, in that moment, that I could fly." Mitsui pointed upwards. "Maybe it was starstuff that gave me that unabating belief in conquering the nation. In many ways, you're right. I was like Sakuragi, but much dumber than him. For those two years of misconduct, I was stuck in that brash, cocky attitude. I thought youth entailed immortality. Talent was God-given. And that made it harder to reconcile with the cruelty of chance."

"The question with no answer," Kasumi reiterated. "'Why me'."

Mitsui nodded. "I was lucky to have met Anzai _sensei_."

"And he's lucky to have you now."

"I'm not to be admired," he commented.

"Elaborate?"

A single pink lily drifted to the boat, glowing at its centre with a sourceless amber light. It warmed Kasumi's countenance as she gazed down at it. Her hair was long, shifting against her face and shoulders, and as she lifted her right hand to draw it away, her fingers were whole.

"Basketball is not a one-man sport. The ready acceptance of the others shamed my childish vendetta. They were the true sportsmen in the first place: focused on the game, and not the grudges that came with its players. Playing is never inherently aggressive, only the flawed men that take part in it."

Another lily joined the first, creating ripples over the glassy surface of the lake.

"Kogure's empathy transcended our positions. He remembered the kid inside the MVP, inside the gang leader. Akagi was the bigger person for not despising me as the jealous rival I once was. He did not scorn the dream for the Nationals that still lay dormant here." Mitsui tapped a fist against his chest. "And Miyagi, it's a wonder that he can stand me on the team without trouncing me at every opportunity."

"I'm a devil, but I'm a fair devil," Miyagi said. He floated past them.

"They're my brothers now," Mitsui said. "The family I choose."

"Damn straight, Mitsui." Miyagi's figure grew faint, and disappeared.

The night was brightening. More flowers appeared, crowding around the boat. The stars dimmed in the pall of the waterborne lights. The sound of deep, steady beats reached Mitsui's ears. Kasumi did not react to them.

"Hisashi."

"Yeah?"

"You're a surprising person. In some ways, you didn't have the same impetus to stick with basketball."

Mitsui looked quizzically across at Kasumi.

"The way I see it, I had substantial, weighty reasons: I was bullied, friendless. I was trying to keep my father, and save my sanity. I don't mean to diminish the significance of your motivations…"

"Them being equally weighted, and all that," Mitsui said.

"Yes."

"Go on."

"It's just… You were so naturally pulled into it. Like an eaglet being dropped into the air, or a turtle hatchling rushing straight for the shushing sea. The fact that you came into basketball without these 'character-building tribulations' seems significant to me. Your parents gave you no ultimatums. There were a hundred other, more desperate middle school boys waiting to fill that position. And yet, it was your unburdened style of playing that captured the essence of the game, and all those who watched you move on the court. You have flair. You innovate. Perhaps you don't see it yourself. But you expand what is defined as basketball: the way you play makes people believe that one can be born into it."

"You're right, Kasumi." Mitsui tried to ignore the resounding staccato. "I _don't_ see it."

He dodged the spray that she flicked languidly at him.

"However, I do value your kind words. Thank you."

He dipped his head, and scratched teal paint off an uneven swirl in the wooden bench beneath him.

" _Senpai_. Wake up." A toneless voice reached his ears, and faded.

A sudden apprehension took hold of Mitsui.

"I don't want this to change, Kasumi." He grabbed the bench. "Time is the thing which works most against us. If we could turn it back, freeze it, free ourselves from its forward-marching tyranny…"

 _Boom, boom_.

Skeins of golden light unspooled over Kasumi's arms and cheeks, turning her into an ethereal other. His desperation was somehow misplaced, Mitsui thought. She belonged to the depths of the sea, where invisible currents eddied and mysterious life thrived without the menial concerns of those land-dwelling inhabitants above.

"Let's keep trying, Hisashi." Kasumi gave Mitsui a trace of a smile. Her expression was achingly beautiful. "If we have learnt anything, it's this: we are not fatalistic, sorrow-bearing creatures. "

 _Boom, boom, boom_. The beat became louder, swelling through the air in translucent gossamer threads.

"Before this ends," Mitsui said, trying to move towards her, "remember this by me."

Her laugh reverberated through him. "Whatever do you intend to do?"

"Give you a kiss." His limbs were weighted. What was going on? A swell of frustration and urgency overtook him.

Her image blurred. "This isn't a fairytale, Hisashi."

He strained. "Do you accept?"

 _Boom_.

She stood. "I always love talking to you, Mitsui-san."


	24. Chapter 24

Epilogue

 _Whap_.

A sharp impact on his buttocks lifted the cottony dredges of sleep from his mind. Mitsui pushed himself off the floor, blinking owlishly as something slipped off him. He stared at it for a period of time, before recognising it as Kasumi's khaki-green jacket.

" _Rise and shine, Miss Briar Rose_."

The basketball returned to Rukawa's hands, and he threw it at the breakaway rim, where it rocketed horizontally off. In a blur of motion, he sprang into the air, reversed the trajectory of the ball, and slammed it home into the basket, making the backboard shudder. Rukawa spun as he dropped back down and landed with hardly a sound. He brought the ball back into his grasp, and rolled his shoulders as he jogged back to the three-point line. It had taken him all of five seconds.

" _Your snoring was getting annoying_ ," Rukawa said.

Mitsui was fully awake now, and he tried to banish his sense of reverence at Rukawa's alley-oop.

" _And then you started to jerk around and make noises like a dog trying to sniff a butt_."

The reverence vanished.

"Is that how you talk to your elders?" Mitsui scowled. He loathed it when Rukawa ran his mouth in English, for he was impeccably adroit at it. "So impudent, Ru-chan."

Rukawa, with complete indifference, turned his back and sprinted for the other basket. The sound of dribbling drummed a litany through the otherwise unoccupied gym. _Boom, boom-boom_.

Through the high windows of the hall, Mitsui glimpsed a lightening sky, the first rays of daylight slanting inward to hit the opposing upper walkway. He stretched, cracking his spine and shoulders, and picked up the jacket. Then Mitsui paused, as the dream came back to him in shadowy, illogical fragments.

Where had the divide between reality and imagination blurred? Him and Kasumi had sat side-by-side against this very wall, and spoken deep into the wee hours. Things large and small had passed between them in their hushed discourse, the night shrouding the gym in confessional drapery. Some of this Mitsui was sure had replayed in the theatre of his slumber, but he knew not which.

Mitsui straightened to a stand, and flung the jacket over one shoulder. A slip of paper came loose, falling to the ground next to his gym bag. He bent and snatched it up. When unfolded, the gridded school stationery was scrawled on both sides with characters. He read:

 _Mitsui,_

 _You've fallen asleep. I've stolen some paper from you; I hope you don't mind. My trickling thoughts call for release, delayed realisation or not._

 _You mentioned increments just now, and I was led to think about Zeno's Paradox, wherein a tortoise stumps a fleet-footed warrior by arguing that the latter will never win him in a race as long as he is granted a head start. Remember when we talked about knowing everything about someone else? I think I might have been that tortoise._

 _The truth of the matter is, the infinitely smaller distances that Achilles has to cover to catch up to the tortoise is offset by the speed at which he covers these endlessly halving intervals. A thing is made of a sum of its parts, and while this sum can be divisible in an infinite number of different ways, both infinitely smaller or infinitely larger, the thing in the end is a total amount that exists. We can say that a person is unfathomably deep, and we would never know the precise details of his being; or a person is immeasurably wide, and we would be ignorant of the breadth of his life's experiences. Yet, the person remains a simultaneously divisible and contained whole._

 _Achilles does not have to run forever in order to catch up to the tortoise, just as one does not have to know the other person inside out in order to progress in a relationship. Functional dysfunction? No, nothing so dire. From the point of acquaintance i.e. during the course of the race, within that sum of infinities are our chances to uncover the expanse that each of us are, in all its pitted, luscious, sharp, sloping, diverse, ever-changing geography._

 _These incremental discoveries are embedded in one's mind in crystals, crystals that shift in structure in an infinitude of ways as one draws upon them again and again. As we come to terms with the magnitude of knowing our not-knowing of the other, perhaps the very progress of time may be halted, yes, stopped, or even folded back on itself._

 _If we consider the indefinite progress of time, should there not be at least one instance at which we arrive back at where we started, to confront the spectres that we have once been? Or at least a similar moment, when the crystal configuration slips into a key-shaped hole and brings the rest of our memories cascading upon us unbidden. In the infinity of the universe, would there not exist other dimensions in which there exists mirror images of us, living the same waking dreams, going through the same pains, ravages, and joys that have once possessed us. Another-us learning, laughing, living…_

 _Maybe getting to know someone inside out is like this. Limitlessness within limits, an eternity within a lifetime. I look at your sleeping form next to me. You're unconscious, drooling, and snoring like an express train, and I wonder why God (if he exists) placed you alongside a friend of a half-handed delinquent. Do you think there is purpose in 'coincidence'? Order within the hegemonic yet differently spliced phenomenon of time? Does every question have an answer, or, indeed, every answer a question? I suppose it's all part of the unknowable infinity, and I just got stuck with this classic, cut-price version of Mitsui Hisashi._

 _Before you go spewing my sage words, I know these concepts are not mathematically sound in any form, and you can please to inform me about it if you should decide to study Pure Maths in uni for the hell of it. But it's a metaphor, albeit a messy one, and I thought you might want to know (re: 'what goes on in that brooding egg of yours'). (Apparently just some non-conclusive rubbish. I'm tired.)_

 _Précis: I am going to bring those tapes to the club room later, I hope you guys have a VCR somewhere._

 _–K_

* * *

The door of the gym slammed back on its tracks. Mitsui looked up to see the basketball team pouring onto the lacquered floors.

"It's in!" Miyagi called.

Ayako and Haruko trotted after him, followed by the freshmen, who carried a long table to the benches. The imposing form of Akagi and the smaller Kogure appeared after Anzai _sensei_.

"Ryou-chin, let me see!" Cackling, Sakuragi pranced after the captain, trying to snatch the sheet of paper from his grasp. "Who will the _tensai_ defeat next?"

Miyagi shoved him away, scowling. "You're being annoying, Hanamichi."

Rukawa and Mitsui converged on the other members.

"Ah, Rukawa-kun, you have been practising hard," Haruko said diffidently. Her mild disposition and maternal inclinations made her well-loved by the team, adding to Ayako's brisk, business-like approach.

Rukawa picked up his white towel and threw it around his neck. " _Maybe_."

Haruko blushed. It was one word more than expected.

"Anzai _sensei_ ," Mitsui greeted brightly, stuffing Kasumi's jacket and note into his bag. "What's up?"

The coach nodded calmly.

"Mitsui, what are you still doing in your school uniform?" Akagi rumbled.

" _Lover boy_ ," Rukawa said.

"Huh?" Everyone shot a glance at the freshman.

Mitsui elbowed him. " _Stop stirring shit,_ Rukawa Kaede," he hissed.

" _I_ –" Mitsui near-shouted, causing their gazes to fasten back on him, "–should be asking, what are you _retirees_ doing here?"

"Watch your big mouth, Mitsui." Akagi scowled and tilted his chin at the table as Kogure laughed obligingly. "I'll leave the news to the managers. Ayako-san?"

"Winter line-ups are out." Ayako slapped the paper from Sakuragi's prying fingers. Anzai _sensei_ took a seat at the table, covering the sheet face-down with one palm.

"Sakuragi-kun, you must learn to have patience."

" _Jiji_ , this genius is fuelled with a player's unquenchable competitive spirit! He cannot hold off his world-class skills any longer, heh heh heh." Sakuragi threw an arm around the coach's neck. "Am I right, old man?"

"No respect for boundaries!" Akagi boxed the redhead on the crown.

"World-class, _my ass_ ," Rukawa muttered, instantly reviving the groaning Sakuragi.

"You want to challenge me, the _tensai_?" Sakuragi jackknifed into a sitting position. "Foolish! I will beat you, Rukawa!"

At Miyagi's rapid direction, Iishi and Sasaoka caught his flailing arms and pinned him to the ground. Ayako and Akagi exchanged looks of exasperation.

"I see you've got your hands full, Miyagi-kun," Kogure said.

"Sedate him for me, please," Miyagi sighed.

"Sakuragi-kun, please be careful not to overstrain your back," Haruko chipped in.

"Haruko-chan!" Sakuragi's convulsions ceased and he raised his head off the floor, eyes shining. "Okay."

Miyagi nodded. "Thanks, Haruko-san."

Mitsui guffawed. Waving off the freshmen, he gave Sakuragi a hand up, and punched him on the shoulder. "Good to see you full of spirit, young blood." Although the short sleep he'd had on the hard floor had been less than comfortable, Mitsui felt revived by Sakuragi's infectious vigour. "What say you, Ayako-san? Who is Shohoku's next challenger?"

Ayako and Haruko gripped either end of a scroll and snapped out a large leaf of paper, on which the district tournament schedule had been manually copied.

In a brief flurry of eye movement, Mitsui found their division. His heart skipped.

"Shoyo."

Rukawa's voice was a purr. Mitsui thought he saw a flicker in the depths of his impenetrable eyes. He looked over at Miyagi, whose gaze had sharpened as well; he was probably thinking of point guard Fujima, rival to Kainan's Maki in last year's Inter Highs.

Akagi broke the silence.

"Going to bail on us again, old guy?" He threw a smile at Mitsui. When they had faced Shoyo in the past quarter finals, the fatigued shooting guard had had to switch out.

Mitsui jerked his chin at Akagi.

"We'll be looking forward to seeing you cheering for Shohoku in the _grandstand_ , Akagi-san," he said sweetly.

"Loudhailers, banners, and all," Kogure joked. "Us third-years would never abandon our dear Mit-chan, not even for the entrance exams that will determine only our future careers and financial stability." He grinned behind his large round glasses.

"I think it's time for Shohoku to get proper support from the rest of the school," Ayako said earnestly.

"The team deserves a brigade as loud as that of Kainan's and Sannoh's," Haruko added.

"I have spoken to Seniichi-san from student council." Ayako tugged the bill of her cap lower over her eyes. "He will schedule a rotating roster for classes to support Shohoku at our away games."

What had Ayako said to the _kaichou_? Mitsui wondered.

"Very good, Ayako-san." Anzai _sensei_ nodded with approval. "A basketball team need not stand alone. The decisiveness of a team in a playoff starts right from the preliminaries."

Although the coach's voice remained level, everyone devoted his or her full attention to his words. Rarely did the White-haired Buddha speak, and it paid to take heed when he roused.

"Today marks another milestone in your journey to conquer the nation." The mere pronouncement of the phrase was arresting. Anzai _sensei_ 's glasses flashed as he looked at Akagi, Miyagi, Rukawa, Sakuragi, and Mitsui. The latter felt his psyche stir, a hum beginning to buzz through his limbs. "Do you remember? The full court press that Shohoku used against Shoyo taxed us to the limits, and their zone defense was effective in paralysing our field goals."

Even Sakuragi remained silent, thinking about how, at that time, he had been fouled out with less than two minutes left in the second half. Never had he repeated that mistake again, which had hindered his decisive play on the court. The players, too, saw clearly how far they had progressed since the Inter Highs. In recent friendly matches against neighbouring schools, none of the opposing teams had posed an insurmountable challenge.

"Remember," Anzai _sensei_ said, "the opponent never sleeps. It continues to invent new strategies, reach bigger goals, and cultivate its deadly strength." His expression was sober. "Do you have the means to overcome your own limits?"

Mitsui knew there danger lay: to become complacent. For to become arrogant was to gamble with a game that offered no inroad without the price of blood and perspiration. He saw whence Miyagi's relentless ethic stemmed, and Mitsui vowed silently to never undermine his authority if he could control himself. Hours on end Miyagi had trained alongside them to master footwork and basic dribbling, driving them like whipped bulls; with the Invitational finally tangible, right _here_ , a metallic taste in his mouth, Mitsui was grateful for the brutal exercises that had made each player on the team tougher, more serious, unbreakable.

"Listen, Shohoku." The coach straightened, and through his voice ran a filament of steel. "Now also remember that your desire to win is stronger."

"Anzai _sensei_ …" Mitsui felt something prick his eye. A resounding chord had been struck within him, and his entire body thrummed to a rush of headiness that surpassed all other sensation.

He caught sight of Miyagi, who seemed transfixed by that large white sheet of paper and the empty boxes to be filled with the future of Shohoku's basketball team. What did he feel, Mitsui thought, the responsibility for its success, the frailty of his own leadership, or the vast pool of competitors outside these four walls? Far he had come from that 'problem child,' leaving behind fruitless romantic pursuits and past antagonisms, to begin to fulfil the legacy of triumph that his predecessor had entrusted him. It was a strength that engendered loyalty.

"Shohoku," Mitsui called, "do we deserve to win?"

One by one, the players perked up and nodded firmly, a ripple of head movements. Mitsui felt defiance sweep through him.

"Shohoku," Mitsui shouted, his voice bouncing from the ceilings, "do we deserve to win?"

Everyone stood erect.

" _Ao!_ "

Akagi's bellow eclipsed the others'. How many other times had he shouted this affirmation in the heat of competition, stoking the pyre that burned within him? His heart yearned so much for the sport that had captured his passion. If only, in another world, basketball was his evermore, his _pneuma_ …

Kogure gritted his teeth. It was his relinquishing of a family; never again would that red jersey on the court. He pleaded silently that he would never forget this feeling – this extraordinary, visceral camaraderie.

"Shohoku," Mitsui yelled, "will we win?"

" _Ao!_ "

Sakuragi looked wonderingly at Mit-chan – so different from the broken and lost spirit that had invaded this very hall, dead intent on laying waste to the team he now loved. Sakuragi grinned; the _tensai_ indeed had a very good supporting cast.

Miyagi felt his heart leap to the thunderous shouts of his team. He looked down at his outspread palms, where once the words 'No. 1 Point Guard' had been scrawled. He met Ayako's gaze, and did not look away. Together, his look said. Let us finish this together.

Anzai _sensei_ noticed a figure standing quietly by the gym doors, legs planted, its arms filled with plastic cassettes. He nodded subtly in acknowledgment.

"Conquer the nation!" Miyagi speared a fist into the air. For the times they had run themselves into the ground. For the times of painful sacrifice for this dream. For the times on the mirrored, endless court, ball in hand, running like his feet were winged by the gods.

" _Conquer the nation!_ "

Even Rukawa held aloft a hand of affirmation. Kasumi ceased breathing, and a tear tracked down her cheek.

A scrap of the dream came back to Mitsui. An apprehending whisper: _Before this ends… what do you intend to do_?

" _Conquer the nation!_ " The cry reverberated through the very structure of the chamber.

He looked at the faces of his teammates in turn. Akagi, the giant of a past order. Rukawa, the alpha. Sakuragi, the genius. Miyagi, their captain. And himself, Mitsui Hisashi: ex-MVP, tarnished and anointed, broken yet whole. Foolish, silly, blind, admirable, fallible, altogether human. Not knowing what would come next, and welcoming the raging, unknowable infinity.

Thrusting his arm into the air, with his entire being, Mitsui joined their battle cry:

" _Conquer the nation!_ "


End file.
